I 



i 



THE 



MODERN TRAVELLER. 




POPULAR DESCRIPTION, 

GEOGRAPHICAL, HISTORICAL, AND TOPOGRAPHICAL, 

OF THE 

VARIOUS COUNTRIES OF THE GLOBE. 



PALESTINE ; 

H OB, * 

THE HOLY LAND. 



V 

LONDON : 
PRINTED FOR JAMES DUNCAN ; 

OLIVER AND BOYD, EDINBURGH; M. OGLE, GLASGOW ; 
AND R. M. TIMS, DUBLIN. 



1824. 



LONDON: 



PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWESj 

Stamford Street 




ADVERTISEMENT. 



In completing the First Volume of the Modern Tra- 
veller, the Editor feels bound to acknowledge the very 
flattering reception which has thus far been given to the 
Work. He ventures to infer, from the general appro- 
bation the specimen has met with, that the promise held 
out in the Prospectus has not been broken ; and he pledges 
himself that no pains shall be spared to render the future 
Numbers equally deserving of the public attention. 

In giving a description of Palestine, it has been 
* v ~ight necessary to go far more minutely into topogra- 
'.al details than will be either requisite or desirable in 
case of other countries. Eveiy acre of the Holy 
id is connected with associations interesting to the 
iquary, the biblical critic, and the Christian reader. 

The chief difficulty which has attended the compilation 
of this volume, has arisen from the variety and copious- 
ness of the materials. Yet, after all, there is ample scope 
for the investigation of future travellers ; and it is hoped 
that this Volume will form a Vade-mecum, that may 
facilitate and direct their inquiries. 

Maundrell and Pococke still deserve to stand at the 
head of those travellers who have visited and described 
the Holy Land. The former is, perhaps, the most cor- 
rect, and one of the most intelligent of all travellers ; 
and all that is to be regretted is, the brevity of his work. 
The latter is indefatigably minute and laboriously learned, 
generally accurate, but often fanciful, and, of course, 
sometimes mistaken. Of preceding travellers, Sandys 
alone has been found worth consulting ; but his credu- 
lity is a drawback on the value of his testimony. Has- 



ADVERTISEMENT. 

selquist and Van Egmont and Heyman have been found 
of considerable use in reference to points overlooked by 
their predecessors. Shaw has also been consulted. 

Of our recent travellers, Dr. Richardson has been found 
the most minute and faithful. He comes next to Maun- 
drell in accuracy ; and the favourable opportunities afforded 
him by his professional character, have enabled him to 
throw more light on the interior state and topography of 
Jerusalem, than any of his predecessors.* Ali Bey 
(Badhia) has supplied a few interesting details, but his 
inaccuracy renders him an unsafe guide. Chateaubriand 
has been found more correct than was anticipated, but his 
assistance has been confined to Jerusalem. Dr. Clarke 
has supplied by his learning some interesting illustrations ; 
but his account of Palestine is, perhaps, the least valuable 
portion of his Travels. To Mr. Buckingham's Travels, 
the Editor must acknowledge himself indebted for consi- 
derable assistance. He has gleaned some valuable infor- 
mation also from the Letters of Mr. Jolliffe, the Notes of 
Mr. Connor, given in Mr. Jowett's Christian Researches, 
the Travels of Sir Frederick Henniker, of Captain Light, 
and of Major Mackworth. 

To Burckhardt, and Burckhardt's learned Editor, sacred 
geography is indebted for much valuable illustration, of 
which the Editor has not neglected to avail himself. A 
similar acknowledgement is due to those indefatigable tra- 
vellers, Captains the Honourable L. J. Irby and James 
Mangles. The ardent zeal which these gentlemen have 
displayed for the prosecution of geographical science, war- 
rants the assurance which the Editor feels, that no apology 
will be required for the use that has been made, or that 
may be made, of their unpublished volume. 

* See, in particular, his account of the Mosque of Omar, (pp. 93— 
117,) which the Dr. had the singular good fortune to be four times 
permitted to visit ; a favour never before extended to a Frank. 



CONTENTS. 

x jiGK 

BOUNDARIES OF PALESTINE 1 

ANCIENT GEOGRAPHY ib. 

MODERN POLITICAL DIVISIONS 6 

POPULATION AND COSTUME 7 

NATURAL HISTORY, CLIMATE, &c. 11 

GENERAL OUTLINE OF THE COUNTRY 17 

ROUTE FROM ACRE TO JAFFA 18 

ROUTE FROM EL ARISCH TO JAFFA 43 

ROUTE FROM JAFFA TO JERUSALEM 55 

DESCRIPTION OF JERUSALEM 69 

THE MOSQUE OF OMAR 93 

THE HOLY SEPULCHRE 123 

THE JEWS 138 

ICHNOGRAPHY, POPULATION OF THE CITY, &c. 141 

TRADE AND GOVERNMENT 148 

MOUNT SION 149 

PLACES WITHOUT THE WALLS 153 

MOUNT OLIVET 168 

BETHLEHEM 172 

SOLOMON'S POOLS 178 

ST. JOHN'S IN THE DESERT 183 

SANTA SABA 189 

IDEAL VIEW OF ANCIENT JERUSALEM 191 

ROUTE FROM JERUSALEM TO HEBRON AND THE 

DEAD SEA 194 



VI CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

THE DEAD SEA 204 

ROUTE TO JERICHO AND THE JORDAN 225 

ROUTE TO NABLOUS AND TIBERIAS 239 

LAKE OF TIBERIAS 285 

FROM TIBERIAS TO NAZARETH 300 

FROM NAZARETH TO SZALT 312 

MOUNT TABOR * 314 

FROM NAZARETH TO ACRE 323 

FROM TIBERIAS TO DAMASCUS 330 

PANIAS 353 

CONCLUDING REMARKS - 363 

APPENDIX. (A.) NATURAL HISTORY 367 

(B-) GLOSSARY 369 

(C.) DESCRIPTION, &c. 370 

(D.) DESIDERATA 371 



DIRECTIONS FOR PLACING THE PLATES. 

Map of Palestine to face the Title. 

View of Jerusalem -69- 

Bethlehem 173 

Plan of Jerusalem 370 



THE 

MODERN TRAVELLER, 

ETC. ETC. 



PALESTINE ; 

OR, 

THE HOLY LAND. 

A District in the South-west of Syria, lying between Lat. 31 and 
33£ N., and Long. 34J and 37 E. ; bounded on the N. by the 
mountains of Libanus and Antilibanus ; on the E. by the Syrian 
Desert ; on the S. by Arabia Petraea and the Desert of Suez ; 
on the W. by the Levant.] 

Palestine, the land of Israel, the kingdom of 
David and Solomon, the most favoured and the most 
guilty country under heaven ; during hetween two 
and three thousand years, the only section of the 
earth where the worship of the true God was per- 
petuated,— 

" Over whose acres walked these blessed feet 
Which eighteen hundred years ago were nailed, 
For our advantage, to the bitter cross" * 

this most interesting of countries is a small canton 
of Syria, included within the limits of the Turkish. 



PART I. 



* Shakspeare. 
B 



2 PALESTINE; OR, 

empire, and governed by the pashas of Acre and 
Damascus. In the map, it presents the appearance 
of a narrow slip of country, extending along the 
eastern coast of the Mediterranean; from which, to 
the river Jordan, the utmost width does not exceed 
fifty miles. This river was the eastern boundary of 
the land of Canaan, or Palestine, properly so called, 
which derived its name from the Philistines or Pales- 
tines originally inhabiting the coast. To three of the 
twelve tribes, however, Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh, 
portions of territory were assigned on the eastern side 
of the river, which were afterwards extended by the 
subjugation of the neighbouring nations. The terri- 
tory of Tyre and Sidon was its ancient border on the 
north-west ; the range of the Libanus and Anti- 
libanus forms a natural boundary on the north and 
north-east ; while in the south, it is pressed upon by 
the Syrian and Arabian deserts. Within this cir- 
cumscribed district, such were the physical advantages 
of the soil and climate, there existed, in the happiest 
periods of the Jewish nation, an immense population, 
The men able to bear arms in the time of Moses, 
somewhat exceeded 600,000 ; which computation, 
when the Levites (20,000) and women and children 
are added, will give nearly two millions and a half as 
the amount of the population — as large as that of 
Sweden.* The kingdom of David and Solomon, 
however, extended far beyond these narrow limits. 
In a north-eastern direction, it was bounded only 
by the river Euphrates, and included a considerable 
part of Syria. It is stated,-]- that Solomon had do-. 

* During the Roman war in the time of Josephus, the pro- 
vince of Galilee alone furnished an army of 100,000 men.— Jos. 
Bell. Jud. lib. ii. cap. 20. § 6. 

f 1 Kings iv. 24. 



THE HOLY LAKD. 



minion over all the region on the western side of the 
Euphrates, from Thiphsah (or Thapsacus) on that 
river, in lat. 35° 20', to Azzah, or Gaza. " Tadmor 
in the wilderness"* (Palmyra), which the Jewish 
monarch is stated to have built, (that is, either 
founded or fortified,) is considerably to the north- 
east of Damascus, being only a day's journey from 
the Euphrates ; and Hamath, the Epiphania of the 
Greeks, (still called Hamah,) in the territory belonging 
to which city Solomon had several " store cities," is 
seated on the Orontes, in lat. 34° 45' N. On the east 
and south-east, the kingdom of Solomon was extended 
by the conquest of the country of Moab, that of the 
Ammonites, and Edom ; and tracts which were either 
inhabited or pastured by the Israelites, lay still fur- 
ther eastward. Maon, which belonged to the tribe 
of Judah, and was situated in or near the desert of 
Paran, *(• is described by Abulfeda as the farthest city 
of Syria towards Arabia, being two days' journey 
beyond Zoar. In the time of David, the people of 
Israel, women and children included, amounted, on 
the lowest computation to five millions, besides the 
tributary Canaanites, and other conquered nations. 

The vast resources of the country, and the power 
of the Jewish monarch, may be estimated, not only by 
the consideration in which he was held by the con- 
temporary sovereigns of Egypt, Tyre, and Assyria, 
but by the strength of the several kingdoms into 
which the dominions of David were subsequently 
divided. Damascus revolted during the reign of 
Solomon, and shook off the Jewish yoke. J At his 
death, ten of the tribes revolted under Jeroboam, and 

* 2 Chror. viii. 4. f Josh. xv. 55. 1 Sam. xxiil. 24 ; xxv. 2. 
$ 1 Kings xi. 24, 25. See also 1 Kings xx. 04. 



4 PALESTINE; OH, 

the country became divided into the two rival king- 
doms of Judah and Israel, having for their capitals 
Jerusalem and Samaria. The kingdom of Israel fell 
before the Assyrian conqueror, in the year B.C. 721, 
after it had subsisted about two hundred and fifty 
years. That of Judah survived about one hundred 
and thirty years, Judea being finally subdued and laid 
waste by Nebuchadnezzar, and the temple burned, 
B.C. 588. Idumea was conquered a few years after. 
From this period till the era of Alexander the Great, 
Palestine remained subject to the Chaldean, Median, 
and Persian dynasties. At his death, Judea fell 
under the dominion of the kings of Syria, and, with 
some chort and troubled intervals, remained subject 
either to the kings of Syria or of Egypt, till John 
Hyrcanus shook off the Syrian yoke, and assumed the 
diadem, B.C. 130. The Asmonean dynasty, which 
united, in the person of the monarch, the functions 
of king and pontiff, though tributary to Roman con- 
querors, lasted one hundred and twenty-six years, 
till the kingdom was given by Anthony to Herod the 
Great, of an Idumean family, B.C. 39.* 

At the time of the Christian era, Palestine was 
divided into five provinces ; Judea, Samaria, Galilee, 
Perea, and Idumea.-j- On the death of Herod, Arche- 

* Thirty-five years before the true date of our Lord's birth, 
which is computed to have taken place four years before the 
vulgar era. 

t The tetrarchy of Judaea consisted of the tiibes of Judah, 
Benjamin, Dan, and Simeon. The rest of the Holy Land, 
according to the Roman division, consisted of Samaria, Galibe, 
Peraea, Decapolis, Gaulonitis, Galaaditis, Batancea, and Auranitis. 
Samaria contained in it the tribes of Ephraim, Issachar, and the 
half tribe of Manasseh. Galilee, the tribes of Zabulon, Asher, 
and Naphthali. Pereea, on the other side of Jordan, consisted 
of the tribes of Gad and Reuben. Decapolis was part of the 



THE HOLY LAND. 



5 



laus, his eldest son, succeeded to the government of 
Judea, Samaria, and Idumea, with the title of te- 
trarch ; Galilee being assigned to Herod Antipas, and 
Perea, or the country beyond Jordan, to the third 
brother, Philip. But in less than ten years, the 
dominions of Archelaus became annexed, on his dis- 
grace, to the Roman province of Syria, and Judea 
was thenceforth governed by Roman procurators. 
Jerusalem, after its final destruction by Titus, A.D. 
71, remained desolate and almost uninhabited, till 
the emperor Hadrian colonized it, and erected temples 
to Jupiter and Venus on its site. The empress 
Helena, in the fourth century, set the example of 
repairing in pilgrimage to the Holy Land, to visit 
the scenes consecrated by the Gospel narrative, and 
the country became enriched by the crowds of devo- 
tees who flocked there. In the beginning of the 
seventh century, it was overrun by the Saracens, who 
held it till Jerusalem was taken by the Crusaders in 
the twelfth. The Latin kingdom of Jerusalem con- 
tinued for about eighty years, during which the Holy 
Land streamed continually with Christian and Sara- 
cen blood. In 1187, Judea was conquered by the 
illustrious Saladin, on the decline of whose kingdom 
it passed through various revolutions, and, at length, 
in 1317? was finally swallowed up in the Turkish 
empire. 

half tribe of Manasseh. Gaulonitis was to the north of it. 
Galaaditis was a hilly country, extending from Mount Lebanon, 
through the half tribe of Manasseh, and the tribes of Gad and 
Reuben. Further north, in the half tribe of Manasseh, was 
Batanaea ; and more northward was Auranitis, or Itursea. Beyond 
this, bordering on the territory of Damascus, was Trachonitis.-, 
Pococke's Travels, book i chap. 1. 



6 



PALESTINE ; OR, 



" Trodden down 
By all in turn, Pagan, and Frank, and Tartar,— 
So runs the dread anathema,— trodden down 
Beneath the' oppressor ; darkness shrouding thee 
From every blessed influence of heaven ; 
Thus hast thou lain for ages, iron-bound 
As with a curse. Thus art thou doomed to lie, 
Yet not for ever." 

Palestine is now distributed into pashalics. That 
of Acre or Akka extends from Djebail nearly to 
Jaffa ; that of Gaza comprehends J affa and the ad- 
jacent plains ; and these two being now united, all 
the coast is under the jurisdiction of the Pasha of 
Acre. Jerusalem, Hebron, Nablous, Tiberias, and, 
in fact, the greater part of Palestine, are included in 
the pashalic of Damascus, now held in conjunction 
with that of Aleppo, which renders the present pasha, 
in effect, the viceroy of Syria. Though both pashas 
continue to be dutiful subjects to the Grand Seignior 
in appearance, and annually transmit considerable 
sums to Constantinople to ensure the yearly renewal 
of their office, they are to be considered as tributaries, 
rather than subjects of the Porte ; and it is supposed 
to be the religious supremacy of the sultan, as caliph 
and vicar of Mahommed, more than any apprehension 
of his power, which prevents them from declaring 
themselves independent. The reverence shewn for 
the flrmauns of the Porte throughout Syria, attests 
the strong hold which the sultan maintains, in this 
character, on the Turkish population. The pashas 
of Egypt and Bagdad are attached to the Turkish 
sovereign by the same ecclesiastical tie, which alone 
has kept the ill-compacted and feeble empire from 
crumbling to ruin. 

The present mixed population of Palestine consists 



THE HOLY LAND. 



7 



of Turks, Syrians, Bedouin Arabs, Jews, Latin, 
Greek, and Armenian Christians, Copts, and Druses. 
In western Palestine, especially on the coast, the 
inhabitants are stated by Burckhardt to bear generally 
more resemblance to the natives of Egypt than to 
those of northern Syria ; while, towards the east of 
Palestine, especially in the villages about Nablous, 
Jerusalem, and Hebron, they are evidently of the true 
Syrian stock in features, though not in language. 
The Syrian physiognomy assumes, however, a cast of 
features characteristically different in the Aleppine, 
the Turkman, the native of Mount Libanus, the 
Damascene, the inhabitant of the sea-coast from 
Beirout to Acre, and the Bedouin.* Dr. Richardson, 
on entering the country from Egypt, was struck at 
the change of physiognomy, as well as of costume, 
observable even at El Arisen, which is in the pashalic 
of Egypt : the people are much fairer, as well as 
cleaner and better dressed. The Turks, in Palestine, 
as elsewhere throughout the empire, occupy all the 
civil and military posts. Greeks form a very nume- 
rous part of the population. A considerable number 
of monks, of different churches and orders, still reside 
in the Holy Land : there is, indeed, scarcely a town 
of any consequence which does not contain at least 
one convent. The country districts are, to a great 
extent, filled with nomadic Arabs. The true Arab 
is always an inhabitant of the desert ; a name given 
to any solitude, whether barren or fertile, and some- 
times applied to extensive pasture-lands. The move- 
ables of a whole family seldom exceed a camel's load. 
Nothing can be simpler in construction than their 
tents. Three upright sticks, driven into the ground, 



Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, p. 340. 



8 



PALESTINE; OR, 



with one laid across the top, form the frame-work, 
and a large brown cloth, made of goat's or camel's 
hair, woven by their women, the covering. The 
manner in which they secure their animals is equally 
simple. Two sticks are driven into the ground, 
between which a rope is stretched and fastened at 
each end ; to this rope the asses and mules are all 
attached by the feet ; the horses also, but apart from 
the asses ; the camels are seldom secured at all. The 
dress of this people in the Holy Land consists of a 
blue shirt or tunic, descending below the knees, the 
legs and feet being exposed ; or the latter are some- 
times covered with the ancient cothurnus or buskin. 
Over this is worn a cloak of very coarse and heavy 
camel's hair cloth, (the sackcloth of the Scriptures,) 
consisting of one square piece, with holes for the arms, 
but having a seam down the back. This appears to 
have been the dress of John the Baptist, as well as of 
the ancient prophets.* The cloak (or hyke) is almost 
universally decorated with black and white stripes, 
passing vertically down the back. The head-dress 
is a small turban, resembling a coarse handkerchief 
bound across the temples, one corner of which gene- 
rally hangs down, and is often fringed with strings in 
knots, by way of ornament. The usual weapons of 
the Arab are, a lance, a poniard, an iron mace, a 
battle-axe, and sometimes, a matchlock gun. The 
usual veil worn by all the females in Syria, except the 
Jewesses, is a large white handkerchief or shawl, -f- 
which covers the head and face, and falls over the 
shoulders. It is astonishing, remarks Dr. Richardson, 

« Matt. iii. 4. Zech. xiii. 4. 

f A red veil is worn by unmarried women and by brides ; it is 
the mark of virginity. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



9 



what a light and cheerful air this costume imparts, 
compared with the dull funereal drapery of the Egyp- 
tian dames. In the dress of the pastoral Arabs, we 
probably have preserved the most faithful represen- 
tation of the ancient Jewish costume. The tunic is 
evidently the inner garment or ^truv of the New 
Testament, while the hyke or cloak corresponds to 
the outer garment or tpxriov. The usual size of the 
hyke is six yards long, and from five to six broad ; 
and as the Arabs sleep in their raiment, as the 
Israelites did of old,* it serves as a bed or blanket at 
night. The toga of the Romans, and the plaid of the 
Highlanders of Scotland, are garments of the same 
kind. The habits of the Bedouin natives have pro- 
bably undergone as little change as their costume. 
" Abraham," remarks Dr. Richardson, " was a 
Bedouin ; and I never saw a fine venerable-looking 
sheikh busied among his flocks and herds, that it did 
not remind me of the holy patriarch himself." 

The Turks wear what we consider as the woman's 
dress, except that both sexes wear large drawers made 
of fine linen or stuff. They, in return, say that the 
Franks go naked, — referring to our tight clothes, 
fitted to the shape. This is an ancient prejudice 
in the East, and the manner of speaking throws light 
on many passages in the New Testament, in which 
being naked means nothing more than stripped to the 
tunic. The Turkish dress, though a restraint on 
activity, is, however, so much more seemly and be- 
coming to the figure than the European habit, that 
English travellers have confessed that they felt half 
naked when mixing with orientals, before they had 
assumed the dress of the country ; or, as one gentle- 



* Deut. xxiv. 13. 
fid 



10 



PALESTINE; OR, 



man expressed it, like a monkey among men. Under 
the tunic is worn a shift of linen, cotton, or gauze. 
The turban is much more becoming than the hat, 
which, as the mark of a Frank, is the abhorrence of 
the Turk. Blue is the colour appointed for the turban 
of a Christian ; white is the privilege of a Moslem ; 
green is the distinguishing badge of the descendants 
of the prophet. For a Christian to assume the white 
turban would, in many places, endanger his life ; and 
were any one to presume to wear a green turban 
without being able to prove his title to it, he would 
be put to death. Lady Hester Stanhope, however, 
whose usual residence is at Mar Elias, in Mount 
Lebanon, is said to have assumed with impunity the 
sacred and forbidden colour. 

Mr. JollifFe gives the following minute description 
of his Turkish equipment. " The most important 
part of the dress resembles very large trowsers, tied 
round the waist with a running girdle ; the texture 
is of cloth, linen, or silk, agreeably to the fancy of 

the wearer Next to these is the kombos^ a sort of 

tunic with long sleeves, and descending almost to the 
ancles ; it is fastened by a rich belt or sash, called 
zennar, in which pistols and other weapons, gaily 
ornamented, are carried. The daraben is a short 
riding vest, worn occasionally over the tunic, instead 
of the cloak called beniss, which is commonly of some 
light fabric, and of a lively colour. But by far the 
most graceful ornament is the bornos (or bumoose),* 
a long, white, -flowing robe, composed of silk and 
camel's hair, and bordered with silk fringe. Nothing 

* The bumoose is worn in Baibary and Egypt, but not in Pales- 
tine, where they wear the black abbti. The Turkish costume varies 
in different countries, and undergoes seemingly a change of name* 
The kombos is the same as the caftan. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



11 



can exceed the lightness and elegance of its texture ; 
its shape is not unlike the ancient palliwn, one ex- 
tremity being usually thrown over the left shoulder. 
The turban is extremely simple, consisting of a red 
cap, decorated in the crown with a tassel of blue silk, 
and having a shawl wound round the circumference. 
The shawl may be of any colour except green ; plain 
white is generally preferred ; but pink and light blue 
are occasionally worn." The expense of a handsome 
suit, and the usual accoutrements, exclusive of pistols, 
&c, is about fifty pounds sterling. 

NATURAL HISTORY, CLIMATE, &c* 

The geographical aspect of Palestine is not less 
diversified than the appearance of its motley popu- 
lation. Its prevailing character but imperfectly corre- 
sponds to its ancient fertility ; but this is chiefly 
owing to the miserable state of vassalage in which its 
inhabitants are held, together with the devastating 
effects of perpetual wars, and probably some physical 
changes. Those writers, ancient and modern, who 
have represented it as barren, must be understood, 
however, as referring only to the mountainous dis- 
tricts round Jerusalem. Abulfeda describes Palestine 
as the moft fertile part of Syria, and the neighbour- 
hood of Jerusalem as one of the most fruitful parts 
of Palestine. An Oriental's ideas of fertility differ 
sufficiently from ours, to explain in part this asser- 
tion ; for to him, plantations of figs, vines, and olives, 
with which the limestone rocks of Judea were once 
covered, would suggest the same associations of plenty 
and opulence that are called up in the mind of an 
Englishman by rich tracts of corn-land. The land of 
Canaan is characterised as flowing with milk and 



12 



PALESTINE; OR, 



honey, and it still answers to this description ; for 
it contains extensive pasture-lands of the richest 
quality, and the rocky country is covered with aro- 
matic plants, yielding to the wild bees, who hive in 
the hollow of the rocks, such abundance of honey, as 
to supply the poorer classes with an article of food. 
Wild honey and locusts were the usual diet of the 
forerunner of our Lord, during his seclusion in the 
desert country of Judea ; from which we may con- 
clude that it was the ordinary fare of the common 
people. The latter are expressly mentioned by Moses 
as lawful and wholesome food ;* and Pliny states that 
they made a considerable part of the food of the Par- 
thians and Ethiopians. They are still eaten in many 
parts of the East ; when sprinkled with salt and 
fried, they are said to taste much like the river cray- 
fish. Honey from the rocks is repeatedly referred to 
in the Scriptures, as a delicious food, and an emblem 
of plenty. -|- Dates are another important article of 
consumption, and the neighbourhood of Judea was 
famous for its numerous palm-trees, J which are 
found springing up from chance-sown kernels in the 
midst of the most arid districts. When to these wild 
productions we add the oil extracted from the olive, 
so essential an article to an Oriental, we shall be at no 
loss to account for the ancient fertility o^the most 
barren districts of Judea, or for the adequacy of the 
soil to the support of so numerous a population, not- 
withstanding the comparatively small proportion of 
arable land. There is no reason to doubt, however, 

* Leviticus xi. 22. 

t 1 Sam. xiv. 25. Psalm lxxxi. 16. 

$ They are mentioned in particular by Strabo, (lib. xvi.) by 
Pliny, (Hist. Nat. lib. xiii. cap. 6.) and by Josephus, (De Bell. Jud. 
lib. i. cap. 6. § 6. lib. iv. cap. 3. § 3.) 



THE HOLY LAND. 13 

that corn and rice would be imported by tbe Tyrian 
merchants, which the Israelites would have no diffi- 
culty in exchanging for the produce of the olive- 
ground and the vineyard, or for their flocks and 
herds.* Delicious wine is still produced in some dis- 
tricts, and the valleys bear plentiful crops of tobacco, 
wheat, barley, and millet. Tacitus compares both 
the climate and the soil, indeed, to those of Italy, 
and he particularly specifies the palm-tree and balsam- 
tree as productions which gave the country an ad- 
vantage over his own. -f Among other indigenous 
productions may be enumerated, the cedar and other 
varieties of the pine, the cypress, the oak, the syca- 
more, the mulberry-tree, the fig-tree, the willow, the 
turpentine -tree, the acacia, the aspen, the arbutus, 
the myrtle, the almond-tree, the tamarisk, the olean- 
der, the peach-tree, the chaste-tree, the carob or 
locust-tree, the oskar, the doom, the mustard -plant, 
the aloe, the citron, the apple, the pomegranate, and 
many flowering shrubs. X The country about Jericho 
was celebrated for its balsam, as well as for its palm- 
trees ; and two plantations of it existed during the 
last war between the Jews and the Romans, for 
which both parties fought desperately. But Grilead 

* In the time of Solomon, indeed, the king of Tyre obtained 
wheat and oil in exchange for the timber he furnished for the 
building of the temple. 1 Kings, v. 11. And in the apostolic age, 
Tyre and Sidon seem to have depended principally on Galilee for 
the means of subsistence. Acts, xii. 20. But all the rice is im- 
ported from Egypt. 

f «* Rari imbres, uber solum: exuberant fruges nostrum ad 
morem, prasterque eas, balsamum et palmae." — Tacitus, Hist. 
lib. v. cap. 6. The palm-tree was the symbol of Palestine. Many 
coins of Vespasian and other emperors are extant, in which Judea 
is personified as a disconsolate female, sitting under a palm-tree. 

t See Appendix, 



14 



PALESTINE ; OH, 



appears to have been the country in which it chiefly 
abounded : hence the name, balm of Gilead. Since 
the country has fallen under the Turkish dominion, 
it has ceased to be cultivated in Palestine, but is still 
found in Arabia. Other indigenous productions have 
either disappeared, or are now confined to circum- 
scribed districts. Iron is found in the mountain range 
of Libanus, and silk is produced in abundance in the 
plains of Samaria. 

Generally speaking, the climate is mild and salu- 
brious. During the months of May, June, July, and 
August, the sky is for the most part cloudless ; but 
during the night, the earth is moistened with a 
copious dew. As in Persia, sultry days are not un- 
frequently succeeded by intensely cold nights. To 
these sudden vicissitudes references are made in the 
Old Testament.* During the other parts of the year, 
there is no deficiency of rain ; and to this circum- 
stance the fertility of Palestine is chiefly attributable, 
in the absence of springs. The streams with which 
it is watered, with the exception of the river Jordan, 
are all brooks or torrents fed by the copious periodical 
rains. In the dry season, the only resource of the 
natives is, the wells or the water collected in the 
rainy season. Hence the high importance attaching 
to the possession of a well in this country, and the 
value set upon a cup of cold water. Throughout 
Syria, the traveller perceives, at stated distances on 
the road, small reservoirs or large vases filled with 
water, having beside them a pot for the use of 
passengers when thirsty. These monuments are 
owing to pious foundations in favour of travellers ; 



* See Gen. xxxi. 40. Psaim cxxi. 6. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



15 



but the greater part are falling into ruin.* It is 
remarkable that in Arabia, most of the inhabited 
places are situated in valleys or hollows : in Palestine, 
on the contrary, the towns and villages are almost 
uniformly built upon hills or heights. The scarcity 
of the rains in Arabia, and their abundance in Pales- 
tine, has been with some plausibility assigned as the 
reason for this difference. The floods in the rainy 
season sometimes pour down from the hills with such 
violence as to sweep every thing before them. The 
Jordan, from this cause, formerly rose periodically 
above its banks. Whether it has worn for itself a 
deeper channel, or discharges its superfluous waters 
by some other means, is not ascertained, but the rise 
is now insufficient to produce inundation. 

We have but imperfect notices of the zoology and 
ornithology of Palestine. The Scriptures contain 
familiar references to the lion, the wolf, the fox, the 
leopard, the hart, the jackal, and the wild boar, which 
lead one to suppose that they were native animals. 
The wilder animals, however, have mostly disap- 
peared. Hasselquist, a pupil of Linnaeus, who visited 
the Holy Land in 1750, mentions, as the only animals 
he saw, the porcupine, the jackal, the fox, the rock- 
goat, and the fallow-deer. Captain Mangles describes 
an animal of the goat species as large as the ass, with 
long, knotty, upright horns ; some bearded, and their 
colour resembled that of the gazelle. The Arabs 
called them meddn or beddn. The horse does not 
appear to have been generally adopted, till after the 
return of the Jews from Babylon. Solomon was the 
first monarch who collected a numerous stud of the 
finest horses that Egypt or Arabia could furnish. In 
the earlier times, the wild ass was deemed worthy of 
* Travels of Ali Bey, vol. ii. p. 210. 



16 PALESTINE; OB, 

being employed for purposes of royal state as well as 
convenience.* The breed of cattle reared in Bashan 
and Giiead were remarkable for their size, strength, 
and fatness t 

In ornithology, the eagle, the vulture, the cormo- 
rant, the bittern, the stork, the owl, the pigeon, the 
swallow, and the dove, were familiar to the Jews. 
Hasselquist enumerates the following from his own 
observation : the vulture, two species, one seen near 
J erusalem, the other near Cana in Galilee ; the 
falcon (falco gentilis and falco tinnunculus), near 
Nazareth ; the jackdaw, in numbers in the oak-woods 
near Galilee ; the green wood-spite (picus viridis), 
at the same place ; the bee-catcher (merops apiaster), 
in the groves and plains between Acra and Nazareth ; 
the nightingale, among the willows at Jordan and 
olive trees of Judea ; the field-lark, 6 every where 
the goldfinch, in the gardens near Nazareth ; the red 
partridge (tetrao rufus), and two other species, the 
quail {tetrao coturnioo)^ and the quail of the Israelites 
(tetrao Israelitarum) ; the turtle-dove and the ring- 
dove. Game is abundant ; partridges, in particular, 
being found in large coveys, so fat and heavy, that 
they may easily be knocked down with a stick. -f- 
Wild geese, ducks, widgeon, snipe, and water-fowl 
of every description, abound in some situations. 

The Holy Land is at present infested with a fright- 
ful number of lizards, different kinds of serpents, 
vipers, scorpions, and various insects. $ Flies of 

* Judges, v. 10; x. 3, 4; xii. 13, 14. 2 Kings, iv. 24. , 
t Tra vels of Ali Bey, vol. ii. p. 210. 

± Dr, Clarke, however, states that the maritime districts of 
Syria and Palestine are free from noxious reptiles and venomous 
insects, which tie adduces in proof of the salubrity of the climate. — 
Travels, part. ii. sect. x. chap. 3. 

\ 




THE HOLY LAND. 



17 



every species are also extremely annoying. Ants are 
so numerous in some parts, that one traveller describes 
the road to Jaffa, from El Arisen, as, for three days' 
journey, a continued ant-hill.* 

The general outlines of the surface of the country 
may be thus laid down. The Jordan, or river of 
Dan, which rises under the lofty peaks of the Anti- 
libanus, and flows in a direction almost constantly 
southward, with the lake of Tiberias, through which 
it passes, and that of Asphaltites (the Dead Sea), 
which it forms by its discharge, divides Palestine 
completely from north to south. In the western 
division, between the Mediterranean and the lake of 
Tiberias, lie the two Galilees. The plain of Es- 
draelon, which occupies the greater part of this tract, 
being two days' journey, or nearly fifty miles in length 
and twenty in breadth, is described by Dr. Clarke as 
one vast meadow, covered with the richest pasture. 
This plain is enclosed on all sides by the mountains, 
and not a house or a tree is to be discovered in it. 
It is completely commanded by Acre, so that the 
possessor of that port is the lord of one of the richest 
territories in the Holy Land. To the south of Galilee 
lies the district of ancient Samaria, now chiefly in- 
cluded in the district of Nablous : it is mountainous, 
but well cultivated, and forms at present the most 
flourishing part of the Holy Land. Judea Proper 
comprises the territory extending from the Dead Sea 
to the Mediterranean, and is composed of a range of 
limestone hills, rising by stages from the level of the 
coast, and becoming more rugged and rocky as you 
approach Jerusalem from Jaffa. Between Jaffa and 
Gaza, westward of the mountains of Judea, lies the 

* Travels of Ali Bey, vol, ii. p. 210. 



18 



PALESTINE; OR, 



tract distinguished as the plain of the Mediterranean 
Sea, the ancient territory of the Philistines, including 
the five cities of Gaza, Askelon, Ashdod, Gath, and 
Ekron.* This district still bears the name of Phalas- 
tin,-{- and forms a separate pashalic ; it may be distin- 
guished as Palestine Proper. 

Having taken this general view of the country, we 
shall now proceed to describe it more in detail, by 
tracing some of the principal routes. Those most 
frequently taken are, in coming from Egypt, from El 
Arisch, by way of Jaffa, to Jerusalem; in landing 
from Europe, from Acre, by Nazareth, to Jerusalem ; 
in coming from Syria, from Damascus to Jerusalem ; 
and the route from Damascus to Mecca. 

ROUTE FROM ACRE TO JAFFA. 

Dr. E. D. Clarke, who visited Palestine in the 
summer of 1801, landed at Acre, then under the do- 
minion of the notorious Djezzar Pasha — an appella- 
tion explained by himself as signifying the butcher. 
This execrable tyrant, whose name carried terror with 
it over all the Holy Land, at one time, shut up in his 
fortress at Acre, defied the whole power of Turkey, 
deriding the menaces of the Capudan Pasha, though 
he affected to venerate the authority of the sultan. 
His real name was Achmed. He was a native of 
Bosnia, and spoke the Sclavonian language better 
than any other. At an early period of his life, he 
sold hi/nself to a slave-merchant in Constantinople, 
and being purchased by Ali Bey in Egypt, rose from 

* Joshua xiii. 3. 1 Sara. vi. 17. Josephus, Antiq. lib. vl. 
cap. 1. 
t Volney, vol. ii. p. 327. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



19 



the humble situation of a Mameluke slave to be 
governor of Cairo. In this situation, according to 
his own account given to Dr. Clarke, he distinguished 
himself by the most rigorous execution of justice ; 
realizing the stories related of Oriental caliphs, by 
mingling in disguise with the inhabitants of the city, 
and thus making himself master of all that was said 
concerning himself, or transacted by his officers. So 
far back as 1784, when M. Volney visited the Holy 
Land, he was pasha of Seide (Sidon) and Acre.* At 
that time, his cavalry amounted to 900 Bosnian and 
Arnaut horsemen ; by sea, he had a frigate, two 
galiots, and a xebeck ; and his revenue amounted to 
400,000/. At the time of Dr. Clarke's arrival, he 
was upwards of sixty years of age, and vain of the 
vigour' which he still retained. Of forty -three pashas 
of three tails then living in the Turkish empire, he 
was, by his own account, the senior. u We found 
him," says Dr. Clarke, " seated on a mat, in a little 
chamber destitute of the meanest article of furniture, 
excepting a coarse, porous, earthenware vessel for 
cooling the water he occasionally drank. He was 
surrounded by persons maimed and disfigured," some 
without a nose, others without an arm, with one ear 
only, or one eye ; marked men, as he termed them— - 
persons bearing signs of their having been instructed to 
serve their master with fidelity. " He scarcely looked 
up to notice our entrance, but continued his employ- 
ment of drawing upon the floor, for one of his en- 
gineers, a plan of some works he was then construct- 

* Dr. Clarke says: '* He has been improperly considered as 
pasha of Acre : his real pashalic was that of Seide, but, at the time 
of our arrival, he was also lord of Damascus, Berytus, Tyre, and 
Sidon." Burckhardt. however, represents the pashalic of Seide to 
be the same as that of Akka 



20 PALESTINE ; Oil, 

ing. His form was athletic, and his long white beard 
entirely covered his breast. His habit was that of a 
common Arab, plain, but clean, consisting of a white 
camlet over a cotton cassock. His turban was also 
white. Neither cushion nor carpet decorated the 
naked boards of his divan. In his girdle he wore a 
poniard set with diamonds ; but this he apologised for 
exhibiting, saying it was his badge of office as gover- 
nor of Acre, and therefore could not be laid aside. 
Having ended his orders to the engineer, we were 
directed to sit upon the end of the divan ; and Signor 
Bertocino, his dragoman, kneeling by his side, he pre- 
pared to hear the cause of our visit." * 

The port of Acre is bad, but Dr. Clarke represents 
it as better than any other along the coast. That of 
Seide is very insecure, and the harbour of Jaffa worse 
than any of the rest. All the rice, which is the staple 
food of the people, enters the country by Acre : the 
lord of that city, therefore, has it in his power to 
cause a famine to be felt over all Syria. This con- 
sideration led the French to direct all their efforts 
towards the possession of Acre ; the key of a public 
granary being the mightiest engine of military opera- 
tion. 44 Hence," observes Dr. Clarke, " we find Acre 
to have been the last place in the Holy Land from 
which the Christians were expelled ; and this it was 
that gave to an old man, pent up in a small tower 
by the sea-side, the extraordinary empire he pos- 
sessed." 

Djezzar was the Herod of his day. At one period, 
having reason to suspect the fidelity of his wives, he 
put seven of them to death with his own hands. No 
person in Acre knew the number of his women, but 



* Travels in various Countries, part ii. § i. chap. 3. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



51 



from the circumstance of a certain number of covers 
being daily placed in a kind of wheel, or turning 
cylinder, so contrived as to convey dishes to the in- 
terior, without any possibility of observing the person 
who received them. If any of them died, the event 
was kept as secret as when he massacred them with 
his own hands. In his public works he aimed at 
magnificence. He built the mosque, the bazar, and 
an elegant public fountain at Acre, using the exten- 
sive remains of Cesarea as a quarry. In all these 
works he was himself both the engineer and the archi- 
tect : he formed the plans, drew the designs, and super- 
intended the execution. He was his own minister, 
chancellor, treasurer, and secretary; often his own 
cook and gardener ; and not unfrequently both judge 
and executioner in the same instant. Such is the 
account given of this extraordinary man by Baron de 
Tott, Volney, and Dr. Clarke. Yet, with the short- 
sighted and narrow-minded policy of an Oriental 
despot, he sacrificed to his avarice the permanent 
prosperity of the districts which he governed. During 
the latter years of his administration, more especially, 
towns that had once been flourishing, were reduced by 
his oppression to a few cottages, and luxuriant plains 
were abandoned to the wandering Arabs. His suc- 
cessor is described by Dr. Richardson as a man of 
milder, if not more enlightened character. He met 
him at Tiberias in 1817, to which place his highness 
had come for the benefit of the hot spring : he was 
a venerable-looking old man, with a long flowing 
white beard, and his manner was kind and un- 
affected. " Unlike his butchering predecessor," says 
Dr. R., " this respectable viceroy bears the charac- 
ter of a humane and good man, and nothing could 



22 



PALESTINE; OK, 



exceed the respect which was shewn him by his at- 
tendants.* 

Acre, more properly Akka,-f- the ancient Ptolemais 
(Acts, xxi. 7), is situated at the north angle of the 
bay to which it gives its name, and which extends in 
a semicircle of three leagues as far as the point of 
Carmel. During the Crusades, it sustained several 
sieges. After the expulsion of the knights of St. 
John of Jerusalem, it fell rapidly into decay, and was 
almost deserted,:}: till Djezzar Pasha, by repairing the 
town and harbour, made it one of the first towns on 
the coast. In modern times it has been rendered 
celebrated for the successful stand it made, with the 
aid of the British under Sir Sidney Smith, against the 
French troops commanded by General Bonaparte, who 
was obliged to raise the siege, after failing in his 
twelfth assault. It is twenty-seven miles south of 
Tyre, twenty -three N.N.W. of Jerusalem. Its pre- 
sent population is estimated at 20,000. Few traces 
remain of its former splendour. The external view of 
Acre, says Dr. Clarke, like that of any other town on 
the Levant, is the only prospect of it worth behold- 
ing. The interior presents, as in the generality of 
Turkish cities, narrow, dirty lanes, with wretched 
shops, and as wretched inhabitants. Sandys noticed 
" the ruins of a palace, which yet doth acknowledge 
King Richard for the founder, confirmed likewise by 
the passant lion." Dr. Clarke describes the remains 
of a considerable edifice answering to this account, 

* Travels along the Mediterranean, vol. ii. p. 431. 
f The Accho of the Hebrew Scriptures. Judges, i. 31. The 
AKH of Strabo. 

$ In 161 0, Sandys states that there were not above 200 or 309 
inhabitants. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



which were conspicuous among the buildings on the 
left of the mosque towards the north side of the city. 
Some pointed arches, and part of the cornice, were 
all that remained : the latter was ornamented with 
enormous stone busts, exhibiting a series of hideous, 
distorted countenances — a representation, perhaps, of 
the heads of Saracens. The Gothic architecture, he 
supposes, led to the idea of its having been " King 
Richard's palace but, at the period referred to by 
the tradition, the English were hardly capable of 
erecting buildings of that character, and its origin 
may be assigned with more probability to the Genoese 
who assisted Baldwin at the capture of Acre, A.D. 
1104 ; the lion being a symbol of Genoa. The ruins 
in question are probably those of the cathedral church 
of St. Andrew, described both by Doubdan, a French 
traveller, who visited Acre in 1852, and by Maundrell, 
as the most conspicuous object, standing on an emi- 
nence not far from the sea-shore. Maundrell particu- 
larises other ruins referrible to the same period ; the 
church of St. John, the tutelar saint of the city in the 
time of the knights templars, who changed its name 
from Ptolemais to St. John d'Acre ; the convent of 
the knights hospitallers ; the palace of the grand 
master of that order, of which a large staircase was 
still standing ; * and " many other ruins of churches, 
palaces, monasteries, forts, &c, extending for mere 
than half a mile in length ; in all which you may 

* This, Pococke states to have been te repaired and inhabited 
by the great Feckerdine, prince of the Druses." — ft At the end of 
this building," he adds, " are the remains of what seem to have 
been a very grand saloon, and a smaller room, of the same archi- 
tecture, at the end of that. To the south there was a noble, 
well-built chapel, the walls of which are (A.D. J738) almost 
entire,* 



24 



PALESTINE; OR, 



discern marks of so much strength, as if every 
building in the city had been contrived for Avar and 
defence." w The carcass," says Sandys, " shews that 
the body hath been strong, double immured, fortified 
with bulwarks and towers, to each wall a ditch lined 
with stone, and under those, divers secret posterns. 
You would think by the ruins, that the city rather con- 
sisted wholly of divers conjoining castles, than any way 
mixed with private dwellings, which witness a notable 
defence and an unequal assault, or that the rage of the 
conquerors extended beyond conquest ; the huge walls 
and arches turned topsy-turvy, and lying like rocks 
upon the foundation." The strength of the city arose 
in part from its advantageous situation. On the south 
and west sides it was washed by the sea ; it had a 
small bay to the east, which Fococke describes as now 
almost filled up ; and he is of opinion, that the river 
Belus was brought through the fosse which ran along 
the ramparts on the north, thus making the city an 
island.* At the period of Dr. Clarke's visit, the 
ruins, with the exception of the cathedral, the arsenal, 
the college of the knights, and the palace of the grand 
master, were so intermingled with modern buildings, 
and in such a state of utter subversion, that it was 
difficult, he says, to afford any satisfactory description 
of them ; and Mr. Buckingham, who was at Acre in 
1816, affirms that " the Christian ruins are altogether 

* " I have great reason to think that the river Belus was 
brought along through the fossee, because it is mentioned in the 
account of the siege, that a certain body of men attacked the city, 
from the bridge over the Belus to the bishop's palace. I examined 
the ground, and discovered what I supposed to be the remains of 
the channel, and actually saw the ruins of a small bridge over it, 
near the town, and of a larger farther on."-- Travels in the East, 
book i. chap. 13. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



gone ;" and " even the three gothic arches called by 
the English sailors king Richard's palace, have been 
razed to the ground." Shafts of red and grey granite, 
and marble pillars, were to be seen throughout the 
town ; some used as thresholds to doorways, others as 
supporters to piazzas, besides several slabs of fine 
marble. " Many superb remains were observed by 
us," says Dr. Clarke, " in the pasha's palace, in the 
khan, the mosque, the public bath, the fountains, and 
other works of the town, consisting of fragments of 
antique marble, the shafts and capitals of granite and 
marble pillars, masses of the verd antique breccia, of 
ancient serpentine, and of the syenite and trap of 
Egypt. In the garden of Djezzar's palace, leading 
to his summer apartment, we saw some pillars of 
yellow variegated marble, of extraordinary beauty ; 
but these, he informed us, he had procured from the 
ruins of Cesarea, upon the coast between Acre and 
Jaffa, together with almost all the marble used in the 
decoration of his very sumptuous mosque. A beautiful 
fountain of white marble, close to the entrance of his 
palace, has also been constructed with materials from 
those ruins." — u The bath is the finest and best built 
of any that we saw in the Turkish empire. Every 
kind of antique marble, together with large pillars of 
Egyptian granite, might be observed among the ma- 
terials employed in building it." 

The country about Acre abounds in cattle, corn, 
olives, and linseed. A great quantity of cotton was, 
in the time of Djezzar Pasha, exported from the place. 
In the light sandy soil, containing a mixture of black 
vegetable earth, which lies near the town, Dr. Clarke 
observed plantations of water-melons, pumpkins, and 
a little corn. Half a mile east of the city, is a small 
hill, improved by art, about half a mile in length, and 

PART I. C 



26 



PALESTINE; OR, 



a quarter of a mile broad, and very steep on every 
side, except to the south-west, which was probably the 
camp of ancient besiegers. To the north of this is an 
irregular rising ground, where there are great ruins 
of vaults, some of which appear to have been reser- 
voirs. To the north-west of this place, and about a 
mile to the north of the city, is another rising ground, 
surmounted with the ruins of a very strong square 
tower, a mosque, and other great buildings, called 
Abouotidy, from a sheik who was buried there.* 
Half way between this place and Acre is a fine well. 
About five miles to the north-east of the town, a 
narrow valley watered by a rivulet, runs for some 
way between high hills : at the end of it rises a hill, 
supposed by Pococke to be Mount Feret, bearing a 
fortress anciently belonging, probably, to the knights 
of St. John ; and at the bottom of the hill is a large 
building of hewn stone. " This place," he says, " is 
called by Europeans the enchanted castle." On leaving 
Acre, and turning towards the south-east, the tra- 
veller crosses the river Belus, near its mouth, where 
the stream is shallow enough to be easily forded on 
horseback. This river rises out of a lake, computed 
to be about six miles distant, towards the south-east, 
called by the ancients Palus Cendovia. Of the sand 
of this river, according to Pliny, glass was first made ; 
and vessels from Italy continued to remove it for the 
glass-houses of Venice and Genoa, so late as the 
middle of the seventeenth century. Farther south- 
ward, towards the south-east corner of the bay of 
Acre, the traveller fords " that ancient river, the 
river Kishon," (Judges v. 21.) a larger stream than 
the Belus, supposed to have its source in the hills to 



* This account is taken from Pococke, uook i. chap. 13. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



27 



the east of tlie plain of Esdraelon, which it intersects* 
Being enlarged by several small streams, it passes 
between Mount Carmel and the hills to the north, 
and then falls into the sea at this point. " In the 
condition we saw it," says Maundrell, " its waters 
were low and inconsiderable ; but in passing along the 
side of the plain, we discerned the tracks of many 
lesser torrents, falling down into it from the moun- 
tains, which must needs make it swell exceedingly 
upon sudden rains, as doubtless it actually did at the 
destruction of Sisera's host." Mount Carmel extends 
from the sea eastward as far as the plain of Esdraelon, 
and southward to Cesarea. Turning the foot of this 
mountain towards the west, you arrive at Caypha, 
which is on the south side of the bay, opposite to 
Acre ; supposed to have derived its name (Kepha) 
from the rocky ground it stands upon, out of which 
many sepulchres are cut, mostly like single coffins, but 
not separated from the rock, and probably of Jewish 
origin. " Caypha," says Dr. Pococke, " is said also 
to have had the name of Porphureon, from the purple 
fish found on this coast, with which they made the 
ancient Tyrian dye. It was a bishopric, and there is 
a well -built old church entire, which might have been 
the cathedral. There are also ruins of a large build- 
ing, that seems to have been the castle ; and they 
have built two forts, as a defence against the corsairs ; 
for this, in reality, is the port of Acre, where ships lie 
at anchor, it being a bad shore on the other side, 
where they cannot remain with safety, by reason of 
the shallowness of the water." 

There are two roads from Acre to the holy city ; 
that by Cesarea and Joppa, which runs for some way 
along the coast, by which St. Paul came to Jerusalem, 
on his return from Macedonia (Acts xxi.); and that 



28 



PALESTINE; OR, 



by Nazareth, taken by Dr. Clarke. We shall pursue 
the first route as far as Jaffa, on the authority chiefly 
of Dr. Pococke. 

Opposite to Caypha, the learned traveller ascended 
Mount Carmel, to the Latin convent of the Car- 
melites, inhabited at that time by only two or three 
monks.* Great part of the present convent, and 
particularly the church and refectory, are grots cut 
out of the rock, this place not long having been made 
a monastery, at the period of Dr. Pococke's visit. 
Towards the foot of the hill is a grot, one of the 
finest, he says, that he ever saw. " It is like a grand 
saloon, and is about forty feet long, twenty wide, and 
fifteen high. It is cut out of the rock, and is now 
converted into a mosque. Over this convent are the 
ruins of the old monastery, where probably the order of 
Carmelites was instituted : it might at first be inhabited 
by the Greek caloyers of the order of St. Elias, who 
had possession of these parts before the Latins were 
established here. Near it is a chapel in a grot, where, 
they say, Elias sometimes lived, which is resorted to 
with great devotion even by the Turks, as well as by 
the Christians and Jews, on the festival of that saint. 
We staid all night in the Latin convent, from which 

♦When Captains Irby and Mangles visited it in 1817* they 
found the building entirely deserted, and the only friar belonging 
to the convent residing at Hepha (Caypha). It was pillaged and 
destroyed by the Arabs after the retreat of the French army 
from the siege of Acre ; the latter having used it as an hospital 
for their sick and wounded, while their operations were carrying 
on ; and in the places where the poor fellows had lain, the num- 
bers still remain by which they were arranged. Near the con- 
vent they noticed some prostrate columns, and in front of a cave, 
shewn as the place where Elijah had his altar, the remains of a 
handsome church in the Gothic style, ascribed, like every thing of 
toe'kiud in the Holy Land, to the empress Helena. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



29 



there is a very fine prospect. The next morning we 
descended the hill, and turning to the west side of it, 
went a little way to the south, and then to the east, 
into a narrow valley, about a mile long, between the 
mountains, and came to the grotto where, they say, 
Elias usually lived. Near it is his fountain, cut out 
of the rock. Here are the ruins of a convent which, 
they say, was built by Brocardus, the second general of 
the Latin Carmelites, who wrote an account of the 
Holy Land. Over this, on the top of the hill, is a 
spot of ground which they call Elias's garden, because 
they find many stones there, resembling pears, olives, 
and, as they imagine, water-melons : the last, when 
broken, appear to be hollow, and the inside beautifully 
crystallized."* 

In this legend we have a specimen of the absurd 
fictions coined by illiterate monks, which are the only 
species of information the traveller is able to obtain 
from the guardians of the supposititious sacred places 
. — fictions not having the slightest pretension to the 
character of local traditions, and often in palpable 
contradiction to the sacred history. Yet, it would 
once have been deemed impious to call in question 
their truth, and they have been gravely repeated by 
the most learned Protestant travellers, with marvel- 
lous credulity. It is observable that the scene of 
every remarkable incident in the Scripture narrative, 
has been laid, by the monks, in grottos or caves; 
in defiance, frequently not of credibility merely, but 
of possibility, as well as in opposition to the known 
habits of the Jews. The real origin of these caves is 
an interesting question ; but the disposition to attach 
a sanctity to such excavations, whether natural or 



* Travels in the East, book i. chap. 14. 
c 2 



30 PALESTINE; OR, 

artificial, seems common to all nations ; it discovered 
itself in the ancient Egyptian and the classic Greek, 
the Christian monk and the idolatrous Hindoo, and 
has been displayed even by the North American 
Indian. They have been converted into tombs and 
temples, have been the scene of heathen mysteries 
and Romish mummeries, the hiding-place of prophets 
and saints,* the cell of the hermit, and the d~;n of the 
robber. Thus motives of the most various kinds have 
led to their formation, and to their being tenanted. 

Mount Carmel is described as a flattened cone, 
about 2,000 feet (some say 1,500) in height, and very 
rocky. Captain Mangles describes it as now quite 
barren, though at the north-eastern foot of it there 
are some pretty olive-grounds. But the name pro- 
perly denotes a range of hills, extending six or eight 
miles from north to south, having on the east a fine 
plain, watered by the Kishon, and on the west a 
narrower plain descending to the sea. The summits 
abound with oak and other trees ; and among bram- 
bles, wild vines and olive-trees may still be found, 
indicating its ancient state of cultivation, to which an 
allusion occurs, Amos i. 2 ; where it is denounced as 
a punishment upon Israel, that " the top of Carmel 
shall wither." There was another Carmel, apparently 
a pastoral district, situated within the tribe of Judah, 
and not far from Maon.-f- It is not always easy to 
determine to which of these the reference is made, 
or whether, in all cases, the word is used as the 
specific name of a place. To this Mount Carmel, 
however, on the top of which Elijah sacrificed, the 
prophet Amos obviously refers, when, speaking in the 

* 1 Kings xviii. 4. Heb. xi. 38. 
Compare Joshua xv. 55. 1 Sam. xxv. 2. 2 Sam. iii. 3. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



31 



name of God, he says : " If they hide themselves in 
the top of Carmel, I will search and take them out 
thence."* But, as the height of the mountain will 
not altogether account for the expression, " hide 
themselves," it is far from improbable, that there 
is an allusion to the caves with which it abounded, 
and which seem to have been places of refuge in the 
time of Elijah. The " excellency of Carmel,"-(- if 
this district be alluded to, may denote either the vine- 
yards and olive grounds which once clothed the sides 
of the mountain, or the rich pastures which the range 
of hills so designated seem to have afforded, and which 
rendered it u the habitation of shepherds." J 

Pursuing the line of the coast, the traveller comes 
to a castle on a small rocky promontory, extending 
about a quarter of a mile into the sea, and nearly half 
a quarter of a mile broad, having a, small bay to the 
south. The place is said by Pococke to bear among 
the Franks the name of Castel Pellegrino, but to be 
called by the natives Athlete. It was formerly called 
Petra incisa. " There seems," he adds, " to have 
been a town to the east and south-east of the pro- 
montory, as appears from the walls, which are almost 
entire, and are built of large hewn stone rusticated." 
The castle he describes as very magnificent, and " so 
finely built, that it may be reckoned as one of the 
things that are best worth seeing in these parts."— 
" It is encompassed with two walls, fifteen feet thick ; 
the inner wall on the east side cannot be less than 
forty feet high, and within it there appear to have 
been some very grand apartments. The offices of the 
fortress seem to have been at the west end, where I 
saw an oven eighteen feet in diameter. In the castle 

* Amos ix. 3- f Isaiah xxix. 17 j xxxiii. 9; xxxv. 2. 
$ Amos. l. 2. 



32 PALESTINE ; OR, 

there are remains of a fine lofty church of ten sides, 
built in a light gothic taste : three chapels are built 
to the three eastern sides, each of which consists of five 
sides, excepting the opening to the church ; in these, it 
is probable, the three chief altars stood. The castle 
seems to have been built by the Greek emperors, as a 
place for arms, at the time when they were apprehen- 
sive of the invasions of the Saracens."* 

When Pococke visited the spot, it does not appear 
to have been inhabited ; but Captains Irby and Man- 
gles found here a modern village situated on the pro- 
montory, and apparently constructed from the ruins 
of the ancient city. " It is," they say, " of small 
extent, and would appear, from its elevated situation 
and the old walls which surround it, to have been a 
citadel, as there are the ruins of two other walls with- 
out it. The outer one, which we may suppose to 
have included the remainder of the ancient town, 
incloses a considerable space of ground now unin- 
habited." Referring to the ruins of the church, they 
state that its form was originally a double hexagon ; 
the half still standing has six sides. On the exterior, 
below the cornice, are human heads and heads of 
animals, (those of the lion, the ram, and the sheep, 
are distinguishable,) in alto-relievo. The exterior 
walls have a double line of arches in the gothic style, 
the architecture light and elegant. " From the com- 
modiousness of the bay, the extent of the quarries in 
the neighbourhood, and the fine rich plains near it, 
though now but partially cultivated, it would seem," 
they add, 44 that this place was formerly of much im- 
portance, and that the neighbourhood, though now 
very thinly inhabited, was once populous." 



* Travels in the East, book i. chap. 15. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



33 



About ten miles to the south of Castel Pellegrino, 
is the small village of Tortura, supposed to be the 
ancient Dora, with a port to the south for large boats, 
which are sometimes forced to put in by stress of 
weather. To the north of the port is a small pro- 
montory, on which there is a ruined castle ; and here, 
probably, was situated the old town. Captain Mangles 
says, " There are extensive ruins here, but they pos- 
sess nothing of interest." 

Between three and four miles south of Tortura, 
the traveller crosses a small river called Coradge, 
supposed by Pococke to be the Kerseos of Ptolemy ; 
and, about three miles north of Cesarea, he passes the 
river Zirka, the fiumen crocodilon of Pliny, and the 
river Cesarea of Palestine of Reland. Dr. Pococke 
was credibly informed on the spot, that there are 
crocodiles in this river, agreeably to Reland's state- 
ment, and that some of these had been brought to 
Acre. " They say the crocodiles are small, not ex- 
ceeding five or six feet in length, but that they have 
taken some young cattle that were standing in the 
river ; so that it is probable, a colony from some city 
in Egypt that worshipped the crocodile, came and 
settled here, and brought their deities along with 
them." 

Cesarea is still called by the Arabs Kissary, but not 
a single inhabitant remains where once stood the 
proud city of Herod. " Perhaps there has not been," 
remarks Dr. Clarke, " in the history of the world, 
an example of any city that in so short a space of 
time rose to such an extraordinary height of splendour 
as did this of Cesarea, or that exhibits a more awful 
contrast to its former magnificence, by the present 
desolate appearance of its ruins. Its theatres, once 
resounding with the shouts of multitudes, echo no 



34 PALESTINE ; OR, 

other sound than the nightly cries of animals roaming 
for their prey. Of its gorgeous palaces and temples, 
enriched with the choicest works of art, and decorated 
with the most precious marbles, scarcely a trace can 
be discerned. Within the space of ten years after 
laying the foundation, from an obscure fortress, 
(called the Tower of Strato, as it is said, from the 
Greek who founded it,) it became the most celebrated 
and nourishing city of all Syria." It was named 
Cesarea by Herod, in honour of Augustus, and 
dedicated by him to that Emperor, in the twenty- 
eighth year of his reign ; and it was called Cesarea of 
Palestine, to distinguish it from Cesarea Philippi, or 
Cesarea Paneadis. It was afterwards called Colonia 
Flavia, in consequence of privileges granted to it by 
Vespasian, who made it a Roman colony. * It is 
reckoned to be thirty-six miles from Acre, thirty 
from Jaffa, and sixty -two from Jerusalem. 

Though conveniently situated for trade, Cesarea 
had originally a very bad harbour ; but Herod, at a 
great expense, made it one of the most convenient 
havens on the coast.-)- A mole is mentioned, which 
was carried out 200 feet into the sea. Dr. Pococke 
observed flat rocks about the port, on which some 
works were probably raised to protect the vessels from 
the westerly winds. The supposed sites of the ancient 
edifices are mere mounds of undennable form, afford- 
ing no basis for topographical conjectures. The 
aqueducts, however, still remain, as monuments of 
its ancient magnificence ; they run north and south. 
The lower aqueduct, which is to the east of the other, 

* On a medal of Marcus Aurelius it is called COL. PRIMA 
FL. AUG. CAESAREA. 

t Josephus, Antiq. lib. xv. cap. 13., and De Bello Jud. lib. i. 
cap. 21. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



55 



is carried along on a wall without arches, and of no 
great height ; it is thirteen feet thick, and seems to 
have conveyed a great hody of water in an arched 
channel, which is five feet six inches wide. The other 
aqueduct, forty yards nearer the sea, is built on 
arches ; the side next the sea is a rusticated work, 
but the east side is plastered with a strong cement. 
Both aqueducts are now almost buried in the sand. 
The walls of the town are said to have been built in 
the time of the Crusades, by Louis IX. of France ; 
they are of small hewn stone, and about a mile in 
circumference, defended by a broad fosse. The 
ancient city extended farther to the north. On a 
point of land stretching from the south-west corner 
of the walls, there are the ruins of a very strong 
castle, to which Pococke is disposed to assign the 
same date as to the walls, and which he describes as 
full of fragments of very fine marble pillars, some of 
granite, and a beautiful grey alabaster. Captain 
Mangles says, that it has apparently been constructed 
on the ruins of a Roman temple, as immense pillars of 
granite form the foundation. These, no doubt, are 
some of the materials used by Djezzar Pasha in the 
construction and decoration of his palace and the 
public buildings at Acre. " Within the walls,' ' con- 
tinues Pococke, " there are great ruins of arched 
houses, which probably were built during the time of 
the Holy War ; but the ground is so much overgrown 
with briers and thistles, that it was impossible to go 
to any part where there was not a beaten path. It 
is a remarkable resort for wild boars, which abound 
also in the neighbouring plain ; and when the Ma- 
hommedans kill them, they leave their carcases on the 
spot, as it would defile them only to touch them. 
There is no other remarkable ruin within the walls, 



PALESTINE; OR, 



except a large church, which probably was the cathe- 
dral of the archbishop, who had twenty bishops under 
him : it is a strong building, and appears to have 
been destroyed by war, as well as the castle. By what 
I could conjecture, it seems to have been built in 
the style of the Syrian churches, with three naves, 
which ended to the east in semicircles, TPhere they 
had their principal altars. The rising ground to the 
south, where I suppose the amphitheatre was built, 
seems to have been the site of a castle in later ages, 
and to have had a square tower at each corner, and 
a fossee on three sides of it." There is reason to 
believe that the Crusaders have had as large a share 
in demolishing the monuments of Jewish and Roman 
art in the Holy Land, as the Moslems. Dr. Clarke 
did not visit Cesarea ; but from off the coast, the 
remains of the city still had the appearance of being 
numerous and extensive, notwithstanding they had 
been so long resorted to as a quarry by the Pasha 
of Acre. 

Cesarea is rendered interesting to the Christian as 
the city where St. Paul so long resided as a prisoner, 
and where he uttered that eloquent oration before 
King Agrippa and Felix, which is preserved in the 
twenty- sixth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles. 
Here also Cornelius the centurion resided, and Philip 
the evangelist ; and repeated mention is made of it 
in the Sacred History, as the port from which the 
apostles embarked for Greece, or at which they 
landed.* 

The road between Cesarea and Jaffa is thus de- 
cribed by Mr. Buckingham, who took this route 
to Jerusalem in 1816. for an hour and a half the 



* See Acts, 30; x. 24; xyiii. 22; xxi. 8, 10. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



37 



road continued along the shore, chiefly on a sandy- 
beach, with here and there beds of rock towards 
the sea ; it then turned up from the sea, and lay 
over desert ground for about an hour ; after which 
it returned to the beach. At three hours' distance 
from Cesarea, Mr. B. crossed a low point of land, 
called Min (Port) Tabos Aboora, where there is a 
small bay, obstructed by broken masses of rock. It 
was said to be a scala, to which fruit is brought from 
the neighbouring country behind Jaffa and to the 
north of it, and here shipped in boats for the more 
northern parts of Syria. At half an hour's distance 
from this point the road again leaves the sea, and 
for about an hour crosses a desert, covered with sand, 
long wild grass, and a few bushes. " At one," 
continues this traveller, " we came in sight of a culti- 
vated plain, with a long valley running eastward, 
and shewing us on the hill the small village of El- 
sheikh Moosa, having a large building in its centre ; 
we crossed this valley, and, ascending a gentle hill, 
came, at half -past one, in sight of a more extensive 
and beautiful plain, covered with trees, and having 
the first carpet of verdure that we had yet seen. On 
the left, Ave entered the small village of El Mukhalid. 
This village resembled an Egyptian one, in the form 
and construction of its huts, more than any we had 
yet passed; and was also the poorest we had seen, 
consisting of not more than ten or fifteen dwellings. 
I was surprised that so fine a situation as it com- 
mands should not have been occupied by some larger 
settlement, as the plains below and at the foot of 
it are more extensive, more beautiful, and, to all 
appearance, quite as fertile as those of Acre, of 
Zabulon, or of Carmel. On going round the village, 
we found, at its south-west angle, a considerable 

PART I. B 



PALESTINE; OR, 



portion of a large building remaining, having nearly 
fifty feet of its side-wall, and one perfect end-wall 
still standing. It was built of well-bewn stones, 
regularly placed and strongly cemented, and shewed 
equally good masonry with that of the fort at Cesarea, 
the style of which it resembled. In one part of the 
side were seen narrow windows and loop-holes ; but 
whether it was solely a military post, a private dwell- 
ing provided for its own defence, or the only remain- 
ing building of some ancient town, we could not decide. 
The presence of broken pottery, and particularly of 
the ribbed kind, scattered about in great quantities 
around the village, and at some distance from it, 
inclined me to the latter opinion. The situation 
corresponds very nearly to that of Antipatris, a city 
built by Herod, and so called after his father 
Antipater. This city is described as being seated 
at the descent of a mountainous country, on the 
border of a plain named Saronas, terminated by the 
sea : which agrees exactly with the local features of 
El Mukhalid."* 

Mr. Buckingham's conjecture, however, is inad- 
missible. Antipatris, the ancient Caphar Saba, (or, 
as Josephus writes it, Chabarzaba,) was seventeen 
miles from Jaffa, ten from Lydda, and twenty- six 
from Cesarea. El Mukhalid is only between seven- 
teen and eighteen miles from Cesarea ; and it is im- 
possible to trace any identity between its present 
name and that of Caphar Saba. Springs and rivulets, 
also, are stated to have distinguished the locality of 
Antipatris. The situation, in point of relative dis- 
tance, corresponds more nearly to that of Apollonia, a 

* Travels in Palestine, by J. S. Buckingham, 8vo. vol. i. 
pp. 217, 218. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



39 



city of Palestine, near the sea, at almost an equal 
distance between Jaffa and Cesarea, referred to by 
Josephus, Pliny, and Ptolemy. The site of Anti- 
patris remains, therefore, to be determined. It was 
to that city that St. Paul was brought by night, under 
a strong escort from Jerusalem, when he was sent a 
prisoner to Felix. Acts xxiii. 31. 

Leaving El Mukhalid, the travellers had the plain 
below it on their left, and soon entered again on 
a desert track of sand, mixed with wild grass and 
a few bushes. They then came to a " narrow, fertile 
pass," having caves and grottos on each side ; at 
the end of which they ascended to an elevated plain 
where husbandmen were sowing, and some thousands 
of starlings covered the ground, as the wild pigeons do 
in Egypt, laying a heavy contribution on the grain. 
Continuing along this plain for above an hour, they 
arrived at the village of Her am, where they halted. 
This village is seated on a high promontory, over- 
looking the sea : though containing not more than 
forty or fifty dwellings, it possesses a mosque, with a 
minaret, the approach to which is over a small green 
plat, with a worn foot-path winding up it, like some 
of our church-paths. Just before entering the village, 
Mr. Buckingham again noticed caves and marks of 
excavated dwellings. On leaving their quarters in 
the morning, they descended to the beach, and con- 
tinued along the coast, under brown cliffs and hills, 
till they came, in about two hours, Mr. Buckingham 
says, to the Nahr-el-Arsouf, which, being shallow, 
they easily forded. Here, in the days of the Crusades, 
stood a castle, which is no longer to be seen. In half 
an hour they came to a little domed fountain, on the 
brow of the cliff ; they observed that the beach beneath 



40 



PALESTINE; OS ? 



was covered with small shells, to the depth of several 
feet. Soon after, they approached Jaffa. 

Captains Irby and Mangles, in passing from Egypt 
to Syria, took the same route along the coast of 
Palestine. After leaving Jaffa, they shortly crossed 
the Nahr el Petras ; of which Mr. Buckingham takes 
no notice unless he mistook it for the Arsouf, which 
would account for his not perceiving any ruins there. 
After crossing Nahr el Petras, the travellers passed 
through a wild but pretty country, and [then] crossed 
the Nahr el Arsouf, leaving the village of that name 
(the ancient Apollonias) on their left. The following 
morning they proceeded very early, and crossing the i 
Nanr el Kasab, arrived at Cesarea.* As they men-, 
tion neither El Mukhalid nor Heram, their account 
throws little light on the account given by Mr. 
Buckingham. 

Jaffa, or Yaffa, the ancient Joppa, is one of the 
most ancient sea-ports in the world; its traditional 
history stretches far back into the twilight of time, 
and Pliny assigns it a date anterior to the deluge. 
In his time, they pretended to exhibit the marks of 
the chain with which Andromeda was fastened to a 
rock ; and the supposed skeleton of the sea-monster 
to which she was exposed was long preserved at 
Home. Here, too, if tradition may be credited, Noah 
built his ark ! Hither, however, the most authentic 
of all records informs us, King Solomon ordered the 
materials of the Temple to be brought by sea from 
Mount Libanus ; here the prophet Jonah embarked 
for Tarshish, 862 years before the Christian era ; and 

* Travels in Egypt, &c. by the Honourable C L. Irby and 
J. Mangles, 8vo. p. 199. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



41 



here, in apostolic times, St. Peter restored Tabitha 
to life. In the middle of the thirteenth century, it 
was fortified by Louis IX. ; but, in 1647, Monconys, a 
French traveller, found nothing at Jaffa, but a castle 
and some caverns. Lastly, in 1799, the modern town 
was taken by Bonaparte, and signalised by that 
massacre of Turkish prisoners, which has afforded 
so much matter for discussion, as one of the darkest 
charges laid against the character of Napoleon.* It 
is situated in lat. 32° 2' N. and long. 34° 53' E., and 
is forty miles W. of Jerusalem. Its situation, as the 
nearest port to the Holy City, has been the chief 
cause of its importance. As a station for vessels, 
according to Dr. Clarke, its harbour is one of the 
worst in the Mediterranean. Ships generally anchor 
about a mile from the town, to avoid the shoals and 
rocks of the place. The badness of the harbour is 
mentioned, indeed, by Josephus. He speaks of both 
Joppa and Dora, as 66 lesser maritime cities, not fit 
for havens, on account of the impetuous south-winds 
that beat upon them ; which rolling the sands that 
come from the sea against the shores do not admit 
of ships lying in their station : but the merchants are 
generally there forced to ride at their anchors on the 
sea itself." And he proceeds to describe the works by 
which Herod endeavoured to rectify a similar incon- 
venience of situation at Cesarea.-f- The road is pro- 
tected by a castle built on a rock, and there are some 

* There is no doubt that the massacre took place ; the only 
question relates to the number, and the probable motive or 
alleged justification. Bonaparte's statement was, that they were 
prisoners who had been dismissed on parole, and who afterwards 
joined the garrison at Jaffa, and that 500 only were put to 
death. 

t Josephus, Antiq. book xv. chap. 9. 



* 



42 



PALESTINE, OK, 



storehouses and magazines on the sea-side. The 
coast is low, but little elevated above the level of 
the sea ; but the town occupies an eminence, in the 
form of a sugar-loaf, with a citadel on the summit. 
The bottom of the hill is surrounded with a wall 
twelve or fourteen feet high, and two or three feet 
thick. The environs are occupied by extensive gar- 
dens, the light sandy soil being peculiarly favourable 
for the production of different kinds of fruit. These 
gardens are fenced with hedges of the prickly pear, 
and are plentifully stocked with pomegranate, orange, 
lemon, and fig-trees, and water-melons. The latter 
are celebrated all over the Levant for their delicious 
flavour. Those which are produced at Jaffa and at 
Damietta in Egypt, seem to owe their peculiar excel- 
lence to the soil and climate of these two places ; for, 
when transplanted, though cultivated in the same man- 
ner, they lose their exquisite flavour, and degenerate 
into the common water-melon. The lemons and 
oranges, also, grow here to a prodigious size. The 
commerce of the town chiefly consists in the importa- 
tion of grain, particularly of rice from Egypt, and the 
export of cotton and soap. In Pococke's time, a great 
trade in soap was carried on at Jaffa : it is made of 
olive-oil and ashes. Egypt was chiefly supplied from 
this port. There are no antiquities in J affa : the place 
would seem to be too old to have any — to have outlived 
all that once rendered it interesting. The inhabitants 
are estimated at between four and five thousand souls, 
of whom the greater part are Turks and Arabs ; the 
Christians are stated to be about six hundred, con- 
sisting of Roman Catholics, Greeks, Maronites, and 
Armenians. The Latins, Greeks, and Armenians, 
have each a small convent for the reception of pil- 
grims. Of these, the Greeks are represented as by 



THE HOLY LAND. 



43 



far the most affable and agreeable to strangers ; the 
Armenians as the most triste and austere, at least in 
appearance. 

At Jaffa, the route' from Egypt by the Desert of 
Suez, falls into what may be considered as the 
high road of pilgrimage to the Holy City. As this 
route completes the line of coast, we shall, hefore 
pursuing the journey to Jerusalem, trace the road 
from El Arisch. 

ROUTE FROM EL ARISCH TO JAFFA. 

El Arisch* is held by the Pasha of Egypt ; but 
as it is the first town on the Syrian side of the Desert 
of Suez, it may be considered as the natural frontier 
of Palestine on that side. It is seated upon a slightly 
elevated rock, in the midst of drifting sands ; and its 
substantial fortress, with the village hanging under 
its eastern front, has an imposing appearance. The 
rock is a shell-limestone, with a greater proportion 
of both chalk and shells than any of the rocks in 
Egypt. The castle was put into good condition by 
the French, and furnished with octagonal towers for 
artillery ; it is defended by twelve pieces of cannon. 
The district of El Arisch is computed to contain 2000 
inhabitants. The water here is slightly brackish. 
Cultivation commences almost immediately beyond, 
but has to struggle with the sand, which is plentifully 
sprinkled over the soil. The route lies, for about 
twenty or twenty-two miles, over an undulating 
surface, in which grass and sand dispute the supe- 
riority, to Sheikh Juide, a ruined village, pleasantly 

* Either the ancient Ostracine or Rhinocolura; probably the 
latter, -which was considered as the last Egyptian town, though on 
the Syrian confines. 



44 PALESTINE; Oil, 

situated at the upper end of a narrow valley : it is 
said to have been burned by the French on their way 
to Egypt, and has never been rebuilt. The tomb 
of the venerable sheikh who has bequeathed his name 
both to the ruins and the valley, is all that remains 
standing. Over it Dr. Richardson saw, suspended 
by the four corners, after the superstitious fashion of 
the country, a black and white cloth, with a large 
ostrich egg, and a few monumental charms hanging 
above it ; close by is an extensive burying-ground ; 
a large field of barley was nearly ripe, while the 
landscape all around was picturesque and cultivated, 
but the crops seemed poor.* They improved in 
appearance on approaching Rafah, (anciently called 
Raphia,) about three hours from Sheikh Juide. -|- 
Here a great battle was fought between Ptolemy the 
Fourth, King of Egypt, and Antiochus the Great, 
the monarch of Syria. On the top of the hill there 
were still standing two columns of grey granite, beside 
a small heap of rubbish. A little way down the hill is 
a deep well, of tolerably good water, the sides of the 
shaft of which are regularly built up, and covered 
at the top to exclude the sun ; it is surrounded with 
scattered columns of granite. Two hours farther brings 
the traveller to Hanoonis, or Khanyounes (Jenysus)^ 
situated on an eminence on the south side of the 
valley; this is the last village which pays tribute 
to the Pasha of Egypt. Dair, the next place, is 
in the pashalic of Gaza. There is no perceptible 
line of division between the two governments. At 

* Richardson's Travels, vol. ii. p. 194. 

t Josephus and Polybius make Raphia the first city in Syria 
in coming from Egypt. It was a bishopric of the Eastern 
Church. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



45 



Dair there is plenty of good water, raised by a water- 
wheel, resembling -the Persian wheels in Egypt and 
Nubia ; and three beautiful marble columns, laid toge- 
ther, form a trough for the cattle. The country 
beyond continues to present the same kind of rural 
scenery ; beautiful undulating fields, covered with 
flocks and herds, and crops of wheat, barley, lentils, 
and tobacco. The breed of black cattle is described as 
not near so handsome, however, as that of Egypt. 
A few miles beyond Dair, at the foot of a hill, the 
traveller crosses the bed of a torrent, about thirty 
yards wide, called El Wadi (or El Oa di) Gaza. The 
fine alluvial plain is, apparently, in the rainy season 
surrounded by the river. 

A slight variation occurs in the route taken by the 
(pseudo) A!i Bey.* Quitting the usual track, he 
traversed some cultivated hills, to the south-east ; he 
remarked, in his way, some fields completely burrowed, 
as he was informed, by the rats, but, he conjectures, 
by djerboas. He gives the distance seven hours from 
El Arisch to Sheikh Zouail, and four hours thence 
in a straight line to Khanyounes : which is described 
as well situated, at a short distance from the sea, and 
surrounded with walls and gardens ; the first inhabited 
place on entering Syria from the south. From hence 
to Gaza is a march of four hours, making the distance 
from El Arisch about forty-eight miles. 

After crossing El Wadi Gaza, the road ascends a 
hill, from the summit of which the whitened tomb of 
the Sheikh Ab Ali is seen crowning the lofty pro- 
montory of the mountains of Hebron on the right, 
and the town and minarets of Gaza occupy the 



* Travels of Ali Bey, vol. ii. pp. 205, 206. 
D 2 



46 



PALESTINE; OK, 



summit of a mound in the plain on the left. A hedge 
of Indian fig lines the road on each side, and a num- 
ber of upright marble tomb-stones mark the spot 
where it turns to the left, and winds, like a serpentine 
walk through pleasure-gardens, to the gates of the 
city. The gardens are enclosed with hedges of Indian 
fig, and abound in tall spreading sycamore trees, 
which give them a delightful appearance, although 
but indifferently stocked. The town and the burying- 
ground cover the top of the eminence, which is about 
two miles in circumference at the base, and appears 
to have been wholly enclosed within the ancient forti- 
fications ; according to the ancient mode of warfare, 
it must have been a place of considerable strength. 
For two months it baffled all the efforts of Alexander 
the Great, Avho was repeatedly repulsed, and wounded 
in the siege : which he afterwards revenged in a most 
infamous manner on the person of the gallant de- 
fender, Betis, whom, while yet alive, having ordered 
his ankles to be bored, he dragged round the walls, 
tied to his chariot-wheels, in the barbarous parade of 
imitating the less savage treatment of the corpse of 
Hector by Achilles. 

There are no antiquities of any consequence at Gaza. 
The streets are very narrow ; and the houses, most 
of which have gardens, are generally without win- 
dows. The country abounds with calcareous stone, 
or coarse marble of a fine white colour, of which all 
the principal edifices are built. There are a number 
of mosques, and some fine tombs. Ths largest mosque 
is an ancient Greek church, to which the Turks have 
added several buildings, in vile taste, which do not 
harmonize with the rest.* In several parts of the town 

* Richardson's Travels, vol. ii. p 108, 109. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



47 



may be seen a few scattered columns of grey granite, 
probably of Roman architecture ; and there are the 
remains of a round edifice, assignable to the same 
period. El Serai (the seraglio), the governor's man- 
sion, is a large awkward -looking building, of Sara- 
cenic architecture. El Muhkumut, or the tribunal, 
the residence of the kadi, is also a large edifice. The 
markets are well supplied ; provisions cheap ; the 
water, which is procured from wells, is both good 
and clear ; the bread indifferent, but the meat, fowls, 
and vegetables, of excellent quality. Altogether there 
is an air of comfort about the town and its inhabit- 
ants, very striking to travellers coming from Egypt. 
The inhabitants are stated by Dr. Richardson to be 
between two and three thousand ; they consist of a 
mixture of Turks and Arabs, " from all the Arabias," 
Egypt, and Syria,— Fellahs, Bedouins, &c, those of 
each nation wearing their particular costume. The 
town is governed by a Turkish aga. Its distance 
from the sea is about three miles ; from J affa a day's 
journey and a half; and " two long days' journey 
from Jerusalem."* 

The sheep of this district are exceedingly fine, 
black -faced and white-faced ; many Of them with a 
brown-coloured fleece ; the leaders of the flock bearing 
the bell, as in this country. The peasantry plough 
with two oxen : the plough is remarkably slight, with 
only one handle ; the beam and yoke so very short, 
that, without moving from his post, the ploughman 
can goad the oxen with the long stick he carries in 
one hand, while he holds the plough with the other. 
Descending from the height of Gaza into the plain, 

* Travels of Ali Bey, vol. ii. pp. 206—208. Richardson's Travels, 
vol. ii. pp. 197—199. 



48 



PALESTINE; OR, 



the traveller, for three-quarters of an hour, passes 
through an olive -"ground, the trees of which are old 
and large, and judiciously planted ; " not crowded 
together in such impenetrable masses as in the Ionian 
Isles, so as to prevent a free circulation of air and 
infect the neighbourhood with a noisome damp, but 
free and open, admitting of the cultivation and healthy- 
growth of vegetables at their roots." On the edge 
of this grove, Dr. Richardson met with a number of 
storks, a bird held in high veneration by the Mus- 
sulmans. A little beyond the small village of Bet 
Hanoon, which lay to the right of the road, he 
crossed the deep bed (then dry) of a winter torrent, 
supposed to be the torrent Escol. The village Beeres- 
nait was on the traveller's right hand, and before him 
Bedigga and Dia, from which he turned to the left, 
to encamp close to the modern village of Barbara. 
The next morning, while the caravan filed along the 
beautiful and well-wooded valley to Ashdod . and 
Yabne, the party ascended the hill, and passing 
through Barbara, turned off towards the sea for the 
ruins of Askelon (pronounced Ascalaan), which lie 
about an hour's distance from the road to Ashdod.* 
It was the month of April. Olive-trees occupied the 

* Captains Irby and Mangles took the more direct route to 
Ashdod. At four a.m. they left Gaza. The road for two hours 
lay through beautiful groves of olive, and then entered on an 
open country, partly cultivated. The travellers left some vil- 
lages cn either side, and passed the torrent Escol, then dry, over 
a bridge of two high arches. About noon, they had on their left 
Majudal, described as a large village with a mosque, situated in a 
valley, surrounded with olive groves. At three p.m. they arrived 
at Ashdod. The distance from Gaza to Ashdod, according to their 
statement, would seem to be eleven hours, or about thirty-three 
miles ; but a deduction is probably to be made for halts, of which 
no notice is taken in the narrative. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



49 



sandy height on the one hand, and fine crops of 
wheat and barley were seen on the other. Arab tents 
were ranged along the edge of the hills, and Arab 
sheikhs were bnsily employed among their nocks in 
the plain. Crossing the sandy ridge, the road descends 
into a well-cultivated plain, at the village called Naide ; 
and then climbs an eminence, on which are the re- 
mains of an edifice with granite columns, like that at 
Rafia. From this point the ruined walls of Askelon 
are seen to advantage. After crossing a small stream 
in the intervening valley, the travellers arrived at 
their base. Their present appearance is thus described 
by the very intelligent traveller whose track we have 
been pursuing. 

" The position of Askelon is strong : the walls are 
built on the top of a ridge of rock that winds round 
the town in a semicircular direction, and terminates 
at each end in the sea. The foundations remain all 
the way round. The walls are of great thickness, 
and, in some places, of considerable height, and 
flanked with towers at different distances. Patches 
of the wall preserve their original elevation ; but, 
in general, it is ruined throughout, and the materials 
lie scattered around the foundation, or rolled down 
the hill on either side. The ground falls within the 
walls in the same manner that it does without : the 
town was situated in the hollow, so that no part of 
it could be seen from the outside of the walls. Nume- 
rous ruined houses still remain, with small gardens 
interspersed among them. We passed on through the 
centre of the ruins, and about the middle of them 
came to a ruined temple or theatre, as it has been 
supposed, part of which had lately been cleared out 
by the exertions of Lady Hester Stanhope. A few 
columns of grey granite, and one of red, with an 



50 



PALESTINE; OR, 



unusually large proportion of feldspar, and some small 
portions of the walls, are all that were then visible of 
this once extensive edifice. In the highest part of the 
town we found the remains of a Christian convent, 
close upon the sea, with a well of excellent water 
beside it. The sea beats strongly against the bank on 
which the convent stands ; and six prostrate columns 
of grey granite, which we saw half covered with the 
waves, attest the effects of its encroachments. There 
is no bay nor any shelter for shipping ; but a small 
harbour, advancing a little way into the town towards 
its eastern extremity, seems to have been formed for 
the accommodation of such small craft as was used 
in the better days of the city. 

" Askelon was one of the proudest satrapies of the 
lords of the Philistines ; now there is not an inhabit- 
ant within its walls ; and the prophecy of Zechariah 
is fulfilled, ' The king shall perish from Gaza, and 
Askelon shall not be inhabited.' * When the pro- 
phecy was uttered, both cities were in an equally 
flourishing condition ; and nothing but the prescience 
of Heaven could pronounce on which of the two, and 
in what manner, the vial of his wrath should thus be 
poured out. Gaza is truly without a king. The 
lofty towers of Askelon lie scattered on the ground, 
and the ruins within its walls do not shelter a human 
being. How is the wrath of man made to praise his 
Creator ! Hath he said, and shall he not do it ? The 
oracle was delivered by the mouth of the prophet 
more than five hundred years before the Christian era, 
and we behold its accomplishment eighteen hundred 
years after that event. 

a Askelon was the birth-place of Herod the Great, 
and several eminent Mussulmans. 

* Zech. ix. 6. See also Zeph. ii. 4. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



51 



" We now pursued our way across the hill, which 
was covered with a plentiful mixture of grass and 
sand, and arrived at the village of Misdal (or Mezdel), 
situated in a beautiful plain, and surrounded with 
small gardens, hedged with the Indian fig-tree. An 
hour and a half from Askelon, we reached the village 
Hamami. Its environs are cultivated, and the crops 
abundant, but quite overgrown with thistles, exten- 
sive plantations of which line the road on each side. 
At present, although our prospect is extensive, there 
is not a tree in sight ; yet the growth of spring 
clothes the undulating fields, and every thing is fresh 
and beautiful.* It is not like the land of Egypt, but 
it is a thousand times more interesting. Having 
passed a large tumulus on the top of an adjoining hill, 
the history of which we could not learn, we came in 
sight of Ashdod (Azotus), pronounced in the country 
Shdood. In about half an hour we crossed a broad 
stone bridge, erected over the bed of a river : there 
was stagnant water in several places. Next we came 
to the ruined village of Tookrair, situated on the top 
of a hill on the left, which seems to have been a place 
of considerable consequence, probably Ekron.-\- Soon 
after, we arrived at Ashdod, passed the town and the 
well, with a small contiguous mosque on the road- 
side, turned into a pleasant grassy field, and pitched 
our tents for the night. 

" The ground around Ashdod is beautifully undu« 
lating, the pasture luxuriant, but not half stocked 

* Sir F. Henniker describes the vale of Askelon as enamelled 
with flowers : <f among others," he says, M our garden pink 
assumes the place of daisies." 

t Ekron was near the sea, between Ashdod and Jamnia. It was 
once a powerful city. Its territory was the border of the land of 
Judah. See Joshua, xv. 11. 



52 



PALESTINE; OR, 



with cattle. The site of the town is on the summit 
of a grassy hill ; and, if we are to believe historians, 
was anciently as strong as it was beautiful. Hero- 
dotus states, that Psammetichus, king of Egypt, spent 
twenty-nine years in besieging the city ; in the end 
he was successful ; an event which is stated to have 
occurred 1124 years B. C, about fifty years before the 
reign of David in Hebron. This was another of the 
five satrapies of the Philistines ; who, when they had 
taken the Ark of God from the Israelites, brought 
it to Ashdod, and carried it into the house of Dagon 
their god. W e neither saw nor heard of any ruins 
here. Scarcely any of the inhabitants carne near us. 
They did not appear to be so sociable or so kind to 
strangers as their neighbours at Barbara. Every 
thing here was dearer than in Egypt : a sheep cost 
eight shillings and sixpence, — the dearest in Egypt 
was seven shillings, and generally but five shillings. 
They charged us four piastres (about two shillings and 
sixpence) for the night's grazing of our camels and 
asses, which, in other places, we had with a free 3 
hearty welcome. The blood of the plundering Philis- 
tines is still in the land." 

Gath, the fifth of the Philistine cities, which was a 
place of strength in the time of the prophets Amos 
and Micah, (B.C. 7©7 — 750,) is placed by Jerome on 
the road between Eleutheropolis and Gaza. It appears 
to have been the extreme boundary of the Philistine 
territory in one direction, as Ekron was on the other : 
hence the expression, (1 Sam. vii. 14.) " from Ekron 
even unto Gath," which has led to its being con- 
sidered as the most southern city, and Ekron the most 
northern. The phrase may be more probably inter- 
preted as intimating, that Gath was the south-eastern 
border, as Ekron was the north-eastern ; but it is not 



THE HOLY LAND. 



53 



clear that the latter was more northward than Ash- 
dod, or the former farther south than Gaza. Gath 
might lay nearer to Arabia ; and it seems to have 
become finally annexed to Judea before the time of 
the prophet Zephaniah, since no mention is made of 
it in the denunciations against Gaza, Ascalon, Ash- 
dod, and Ekron, " the inhabitants of the sea-coast 
and the land of the Philistines.' , (Zeph. ii. 4, 5.) 

From Ashdod' to Jaffa is four hours' journey, or 
about twelve miles. The route lies over an undu- 
lating surface ; the hills are high and partially culti- 
vated, with abundance of thistles. The beautiful 
gardens of Jaffa commence on each side of the road, at 
the lowest part of the plain, a considerable distance 
from the town. The only places mentioned by Dr. 
Richardson as lying between Ashdod and Jaffa, are 
the villages Bededjen, (two hours from Ashdod,) and 
Djedou. Captains Irby and Mangles appear to have 
taken a different and less direct route. They crossed 
the Nahr (or river) El Rubin, close to the ruins of a 
Roman bridge, one great arch of which, and part of 
another, still remain, overgrown with bushes and 
weeds. The river above the bridge was nearly dry, 
(Oct. 11,) and filled with wild flowers and rushes. 
Below it they noticed " a handsome winding sheet of 
water, the banks of which were likewise covered with 
various water-flowers, and many black water-fowl 
were swimming on its surface : the water is bad, but 
not salt. On the opposite side of this river, on a small 
eminence, is Sheikh Rubin's tomb, surrounded by a 
square wall, with some trees inclosed. There are in 
Syria and Egypt numbers of these tombs, which the 
Arabs erect to the memory of any man who, they 
think, has led a holy life ; giving the title of sheikh, 
not only to their chiefs, but also to their saints. These 



54 



PALESTINE; OR, 



tombs "are generally placed in some conspicuous spot, 
frequently on the top of some mount. The sepulchre 
consists of a small apartment, with a cupola over it, 
whitewashed externally (see Matt, xxiii. 27) : within 
are deposited a mat and a jar of water, for the ablu- 
tion of such as retire thither for devotion. Sheikh 
Rubin, who lived many years ago, appears to have 
been much respected, and the people to this day go to 
pay vows at his shrine : they also bring provisions, 
and make festivals there. The river, no doubt, re- 
ceives its appellation from this sheikh."* 

The travellers passed, on their right, Yabne, the 
ancient Jabneh, or Jamnia, situated on a small emi- 
nence : it is still a considerable village. It lies about 
three hours' distance from Ashdod, and is reckoned 
to be 240 furlongs from Jerusalem. This was another 
of the Philistine cities, and was taken by Uzziah, 
King of Judah. (See 2 Chron. xxvi. 6.) 

The route from Gaza, taken by Ali Bey, was much 
the same : it lay first E. N. E. ; then N. E. and N. 
through Ashdod ; then N. N. E. and N. E., passing 
by Yabne, and over some wooded hills ; and at length 
turned N.W. to Jaffa. The distance cannot be much 
less than forty miles. All the villages in this route 
are, according to this traveller, situated upon heights ; 
the houses are extremely low, covered with thatch, 
and surrounded with plantations and gardens. The 
hills were covered (it was in the month of July) with 
olive-trees, and plantations of tobacco in full blossom. 
" All the country of Palestine," he says, " which I 
saw from Khanyounes to Jaffa, is beautiful. It is 
composed of undulating hills, of a rich soil similar to 

* Travels in Egypt, &c. By the Hon. C. JU Irby and James 
Mangles* 8vo. pp. 183, 4* 



THE HOLY LAND. 



55 



the slime of the Nile, and is covered with the richest 
and finest vegetation. But there is not a single river 
in all the district ; there is not even a spring. All the 
torrents I crossed were dry, and the inhabitants have 
no other water to drink than that which they collect 
in the rainy season, nor any other means of irrigation 
than rain-water, and that of the wells, which is in- 
deed good."* 

ROUTE FROM JAFFA TO JERUSALEM. 

From Jaffa to Kamla is a journey of three hours,— 
about nine miles. The road lies over an undulating 
surface, partially cultivated and thinly inhabited, of a 
wilder and less inviting character than the country of 
the Philistines. A good deal of wood is to be seen 
near Jaffa ; but afterwards, the road is bare, except 
that olive-trees cover some of the hills. The neigh- 
bourhood of Ramla, however, is adorned with many 
trees, among which the palm is conspicuous. 

Ramla, or Rameli, the ancient Rama (of Ephraim), 
and supposed to be the Arimathea of the New Testa- 
ment, is, by Phocas, computed to be 37 miles from 
Jerusalem : -f- it is situated in a rich plain, and con- 
tains about 2000 families. Here is a Latin convent, 
the whole brotherhood of which are Spaniards, said to 
have been founded by Philip the Good, duke of Bur- 
gundy ; it is the universal home of Christian travel- 
lers in this quarter. The Greeks and Armenians 
have also convents here. There were two churches, 
which are now converted into mosques. The great 

* Travels of Ali Bey, vol. ii. p. 209. 

f If this be correct, Jaffa cannot be less than forty-six or forty- 
seven miles from Jerusalem ; though Quaresmius, on the authority 
of Jerome, makes it only forty. 

$ Travels of Ali Bey, p. 211. 



56 



PALESTINE; OR, 



mosque was a Greek church : the tower is very lofty, 
and in good preservation. Near it is a large building, 
supported by pillars, supposed to be the remains of 
a monastery. In one of the mosques is the tomb of 
Aayoub Bey, a Mamelouk, who fled from Egypt on 
the arrival of the French, and died here : it is of 
beautiful white marble, with bas-reliefs, and gilt in- 
scriptions. Near the Latin burial-place Is a large 
tank, or cistern, under ground, which has always 
plenty of good water in it. " The root of the tama- 
risk-tree growing into it," Pococke says, " the waters 
are esteemed good for the dropsy." There are, he 
tells us, great ruins of houses in this place ; so that it 
seems formerly to have been a much more considerable 
town than it is at present, and it probably flourished 
during the time of the Crusades. On a high hill to 
the west of the town, stands a venerable ruin, called 
the Tower of the Martyrs, with some stately syca- 
mores near it, overlooking the plain. The bodies of 
the martyrs of Sebaste, in Armenia, are said to have 
been deposited at Ramla ; and from them, probably, 
the tower receives its name. 

About a league to the E. N. E. in this plain is 
Lydda, still called Loudd, where St. Peter cured 
JEneas of the palsy. It was destroyed by Cestius in 
the beginning of the Jewish war, and, when rebuilt, 
was called Diospolis. It is now a poor village ; but the 
stones to be seen in the modern buildings, shew that 
it has been a place of some consequence. Here are 
the remains of a very fine church, built of hewn stone, 
and of excellent masonry. It is attributed by some 
writers to the emperor Justinian, by others to a king 
of England ; but Pococke concludes that it was pro- 
bably repaired by Richard Cceur de Lion, the archi- 
tecture being decidedly of higher antiquity. The 



THE HOLY LAND. 



57 



Greeks hold (or then held) the eastern part of the 
ruined church ; which is uncovered, except that over 
the high altar there remains a pointed arch, which, 
perhaps, was built when the church was repaired. 
The Turks have turned the west end into a mosque ; 
having, says Pococke, a great veneration for St. George, 
who, according to the legend of the place, suffered 
here. All this country is described by the learned 
traveller as very rich soil, throwing up a great quan- 
tity of herbage ; among which he specifies chardons, 
rue, fennel, and the striped thistle, " probably on this 
account called the holy thistle." A great variety of 
anemonies, he was told, grow in the neighbourhood. 
" I saw likewise," he adds, " many tulips growing 
wild in the fields (in March) ; and any one who con- 
siders how beautiful those flowers are to the eye, 
would be apt to conjecture that these are the lilies to 
which Solomon, in all his glory, was not to be com- 
pared." The lily referred to by our Lord, is, however, 
supposed by some critics to have rather been the 
Amaryllis lutea, or autumnal Narcissus, which is 
found in profusion in the countries bordering on the 
Levant, clothing the fields in autumn with a vivid 
golden brilliancy. 

Between Rama and Jeremiah, about twelve miles 
from Jerusalem, lies the Arab village of Bethoor, 
where Dr. Clarke was by accident compelled to pass 
a night. It is noticed by no other traveller ; and 
yet, there is the highest probability that this is the 
Beth-horon of the Scriptures, which Josephus places 
in this direction. St. Jerome associates it with Rama, 
in the remark that they were then, together with 
other noble cities built by Solomon, only poor villages. 
Beth-horon stood on the confines of Ephrain and 
Benjamin ; which, according to the learned traveller, 



58 PALESTINE; OR, 

exactly answers to the situation of Bethoor. He sup- 
poses it, from its situation on a hill, to be Beth-horon 
the upper, (the Beth-horon superior of Eusebius,) of 
which frequent notice occurs in the apocryphal 
writings. Josephus mentions that Cestius, the Ro- 
man general, marched upon Jerusalem by way of 
Lydda and Beth-horon.* 

In this neighbourhood the Arabs are very trouble- 
some : sometimes they have been known to rob the 
inhabitants of Ramla in their very gardens. In Po- 
cocke's time, it was considered as one of the most 
dangerous roads in Turkey.-]- For some miles the 
road is over a level plain, the ground somewhat 
marshy : it then rises as you approach the rocky 
scenery ; and just before the road enters the hills, at 
a short distance, is the place called Ladroun by the 
Franks, which admits of a various interpretation. 
Pococke, who describes it as a large ruined building 
over a precipice, supposes it to be " what is commonly 
called the castle of the good thief, where they say he was 
born and lived." In other words, the monks, who 
must needs assign a local habitation for every per- 
sonage spoken of in the New Testament, have pitched 
upon this very suitable spot as the imaginary resi- 

* See 1 Mace. iii. 16; vii. 39; ix. 50. Josh. x. 10, 11. 1 Chron. 
vii. 24. Joseph. Jewish Wars, lib. ii. cap. 23. 

f The whole distance from Jerusalem to Jaffa, according to the 
usual time of travelling, might be performed in about fifteen or 
sixteen hours: «« but owing," says Dr. Clarke, "to rugged and 
pathless rocks, over which the traveller must pass, it is impossible 
to perform it in less than a day and a half. When it is considered 
that this has always been the principal route of pilgrims, and that 
during the Crusades it was much frequented, it is singular that no 
attempt was ever made to facilitate the approach to the Holy City. 
The wildest passes of the Apennines are not less open to travel- 
lers. No part of the country is so much infested by predatory 
Arabs."-~T/m'efe, vol. iv. 8vo. chap. ix. p. 420. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



59 



dence of the penitent malefactor, one of those who 
was crucified with our Lord ; and the building may 
have received its name from him. Dr. Richardson, 
however, interprets it, the den of thieves ; and the 
encounter which he had with its inhabitants suffi- 
ciently justified the appellation. The party were pro- 
ceeding merrily along a scarcely-perceptible track on 
the turf, when a haggard-looking Arab, springing 
across the field, seized Lord Corry's mule by the 
bridle, and refused to let him proceed. He happened 
to be in advance of the party. The affair might have 
had an unpleasant issue, but one of the muleteers 
coming up, explained to the Arab that they were 
travelling under the protection of the governor of 
Jaffa, and that the brother of a distinguished chieftain 
was their conductor. " Instantly at the sound, (says 
Dr. R.,) he dropped the bridle, and walked off, gnash- 
ing his whetted teeth over the prey that had just been 
snatched from his jaws, having taken us for unpro- 
tected pilgrims, whom it was his intention to insult, 
plunder, and detain. How blank and dastard he 
looked, the ragged red-haired knave, as he slunk 
across the field to his thievish den, that lay in the 
shape of a farm-house, a little off the road," — the 
identical Ladron.* 

The aspect of this part of the country is bleak, the 
trees are few and small,-)- the soil hard, and of a bad 
quality ; mountains of naked limestone. The prospect 
among the hills is described by Dr. Clarke, as resem- 
bling the worst parts of the Apennines. We shall 
avail ourselves of the picturesque description given by 

* Travels, vol. ii. p. 220. 

t Chateaubriand particularises the dwarf oak, the box-tree, the 
rose-laurel, and the olive. 



60 PALESTINE; OR, 

Dr. Richardson of the road from this point to Jeru- 
salem. 

" In about two hours and a half from the time 
that we left Ramla, we entered the mountain scenery, 
the hill country of Judea. For some time before we 
reached the mountains, we kept looking up at their 
dusky sides, as they rose in towering grandeur to the 
height of about a thousand or fifteen hundred feet 
above onr heads, covered with sun-burnt grass ; here 
and there disclosing strips of the bare horizontal rock, 
and diversified with a few bushy trees that stood at 
very unfriendly and forlorn distances from each other. 
Having entered the mountain denies, we moved along 
a deep and most uncomfortable track, covered with 
big sharp stones, sometimes down a steep and almost 
precipitous descent, which obliged us to alight and 
lead our mules ; at other times along the dry stony 
bed of a winter torrent, which we had to cross and 
recross half a dozen times in the course of a hundred 
yards : at other times we climbed a heavy and length- 
ened ascent, with only a few shrubs between us and 
the edge of the precipice. Thus we continued ascend- 
ing and descending, one while round the projecting 
base of the mountain, another while winding in the 
hollow curve formed by the meeting of their circular 
edges, till about one o'clock, when we stopt to refresh 
the animals, having arrived at a well of good water 
beside a ruined edifice, that seemed to have been 
erected as a military station to guard the pass. Since 
entering the mountain scenery we travelled all in a 
body ; the riders not separating from the beasts of 
burden for fear of any unexpected attack, or any 
lurching cur among our own numbers setting off with 
a straggler, which the nature of the ground would 



THE HOLY LAND. 



61 



soon enable him to conceal, and set every search at 
defiance. 

" Here we found the advantage of our gallant 
escort from the governor of Yaffa ; for scarcely had 
we alighted from our mules to repose ourselves on the 
scattered stones of the ruin, when a comfortable col- 
lation was brought us by a peasant from a neigh- 
bouring village, the master of which had a great 
friendship for the brother of Abougosh. Whence he 
came, or whither he went, we could not tell ; there 
was no house or village in sight ; but we profited by 
his hospitality, and resumed our march with redoubled 
vigour. 

" The road continued nearly the same with that 
already described. The hills, from the commence- 
ment of the mountain scenery, are all of a round 
handsome shape, meeting in the base and separated 
at the tops, not in peaks or pointed acuminations, but 
like the gradual retiring of two round balls, placed in 
juxta-position. Their sides are partially covered with 
earth, which nourishes a feeble sprinkling of withered 
grass, with here and there a dwarf tree or solitary 
shrub. They are not susceptible of cultivation, ex- 
cept on the very summit, where we saw the plough 
going in several places. They might be terraced, but 
there are no traces of their ever having been so. The 
rock crops out in many places, but never in preci- 
pitous cliffs ; the strata are horizontal, and in many 
places have exactly the appearance of the stone courses 
in a building. The features of the whole scenery 
brought strongly to my recollection the ride from 
Sanquhar to Lead -hills, in Scotland ; and to those who 
have visited this interesting part of my native country, 
I can assure them, the comparison gives a favourable 
representation of the hills of Judea. But there are 

PART I. E 



62 PALESTINE; OR, 

two remarkable points of difference, which I must not 
pass unnoticed : in the northern scenery, the traveller 
passes over an excellent road, and travels among an 
honest and industrious population, where the con- 
versation of the commonest people will often delight 
and surprise the man of letters. But among the hills 
of Palestine, the road is almost impassable, and the 
traveller finds himself among a set of infamous and 
ignorant thieves, who would cut his throat for a 
farthing, and rob him of his property for the mere 
pleasure of doing it. 

" At half-past three o'clock we reached the village 
of Karialoonah, the residence of Ibrahim Abougosh, 
the brother of our conductor, the chief of his tribe, 
the prince of the Arabs, and a plunderer of pilgrims. 
However, we had nothing to fear ; we were conducted 
by his brother, and had, moreover, a letter of intro- 
duction from the Lady Hester Stanhope. The worthy 
veteran appeared to have been apprized of our coming, 
for immediately on our arrival he presented himself to 
welcome us. He was habited after the fashion of his 
country, with a tobacco-pipe in his hand, and a fine 
India shawl, for a turban, on his head ; the other 
parts of his dress were of unbleached cotton cloth, 
plain and homely, like that of the Bedo weens. In 
stature he is rather under the middling size, but of a 
robust and vigorous make, admirably formed for sup- 
porting fatigue ; his complexion is swarthy, his features 
regular and animated, with a fine dark eye, placid 
and moist as a drop of dew. You would say that this 
man is formed to make love and captivate the hearts 
of his species ; better fitted for the bower than the 
field, more a Paris than a Hector, a servant of Venus 
than a votary of Mars. This individual possessed his 
own mind, and modelled his exterior by an unusual 



THE HOLY LAND. 



63 



calmness of manner; when he spoke, the man was 
rarely revealed in his countenance ; a secret purpose 
lurked in the bottom of his eye, that shewed his heart? 
had other game than what was started by his tongue. 
We looked, admired, and looked again. Is this the 
man that rules the Arabs, of whom even the Turkish 
governors are afraid ? 

" There was time enough for us to have gone to 
Jerusalem, but here we had determined to stay, and 
had turned off the road into a dry stony field on the 
left, to take up our station, and pitch our tents for the 
night, when the chieftain preferred a pressing request 
to the noble traveller, that we should save ourselves 
that trouble, and make his house our home, with such 
accommodation as he could afford. The request was 
made in such an hospitable manner, and so ardently 
seconded by his brother, that it was impossible to 
refuse it ; and it would have been imprudent, had we 
been so inclined. 

" Having accepted the invitation, we followed our 
host across the road to his house on the other side of 
the valley. Orders were immediately given to prepare 
dinner for the party, and we walked with him about 
the premises till it was ready. The residence of this 
Arab chief is about two hours and a half distant from 
Jerusalem ; it is pleasantly situated on the east side 
of the valley, and resembles very much the mansion 
and offices of a wealthy farmer in this country, having 
much accommodation for men, horses, and cattle, 
without regard to taste or appearance. Everything 
about it is more useful than ornamental : the ground 
around is terraced and of a good quality, little culti- 
vated, but abundantly shewing its fertility in long 
grass, olive, sycamore, and fig trees, which are in. 
greater numbers on the other bide of the valley than 



64 



PALESTINE; OR, 



around the house. On the top of a high mountain to 
the south stands Modin, still called by the same name, 
and still a place of strength ; it is in the territory of 
Abougosh, and known as the site of the city and tombs 
of the illustrious and patriotic Maccabees. Here Simon 
of that family set up seven pyramids, one against 
another, for his father, his mother, his four brethren, 
and himself. Much building and ruin still remain 
about the place. 

" There is little to be seen, however, as to beauty 
or repair, about the mansion of an Arab chief. The 
sun sinks beneath the horizon, and we enter his sub- 
stantial dwelling. The prince himself led the way up 
one pair of stairs, followed by the Earl and Countess 
of Belmore, and the gentlemen of their suite. He 
conducted us into his principal room, which was fitted 
up in the usual Eastern style. A low portion, cut off 
by a rail across the room, for the servants or visitors 
of inferior consideration to stand without, and an ele- 
vated and a larger portion within, provided with a low 
sofa round the sides on the floor, for the accommoda- 
tion of those visitors whom the chief delighted to ho- 
nour. One small window illuminated the apartment ; 
but it was now beginning to get dark, and the light 
of the sun was succeeded by that of a solitary candle, 
which only served to make darkness a little more visi- 
ble than the faint rays of twilight. 

;i On the appearance of dinner, the farthing candle 
was exchanged for one of larger dimensions, set upon 
the floor ; the dinner was also set down on the floor at 
our feet, and we hitched down from the edge of the 
sofa to reach it. It consisted of a great profusion of 
rice, boiled fowl, different kinds of boiled and minced 
meat and rice mixed together, forming a kind of 
sausage, enclosed in the skin of a gourd, resembling 



THE HOLY LAND. 



65 



a cucumber, and several other trifling articles ; all of 
which were so admirably seasoned, that having tasted 
of one, we felt no disposition to quit it for another, 
and when we had done so, were as little inclined to 
return or to change it for a third or a fourth : yet 
most of us, I believe, were induced to try a little of 
each of them, and became such proselytes to Arab 
cookery, that we protested in good earnest we should 
wish to dine so every day in our lives, as far as eating 
was concerned, though neither roast -beef nor plum- 
pudding were among the dishes. Not so with respect 
to the auxiliary implements of feeding, which were 
rather of an awkward description, though ancient as 
our mouths, and all of us had them in our finger ends. 
Fork and knives there were none, and only one spoon 
to help a little lebn or sour milk upon the rice. When 
the invitation to commence the attack issued from 
the lips of our landlord, we looked at each other, as 
much as to say, 6 How shall we proceed V The good 
man himself sat by, and, out of respect for his guests, 
did not mean to partake of any thing till they were 
satisfied, which Lord Belmore perceiving, imme- 
diately requested that he would set us the example. 
Then 6 bismilla,' in the name of the Lord, — a pretty 
general, though not a universal signal among the 
Arabs to commence the act of manducation ; — he 
tucked up the long dangling sleeves of his shirt as 
far as his elbow, and thrust his washed hand into 
the mountain of rice that smoked before him, and 
having taken a handful, he formed it into an oblong 
ball, by folding his fist ; this being done, he put 
his finger and thumb behind it, thrust it into his 
mouth, and down his throat in the twinkling of an 
eye. Then he tore off the leg of a fowl, part of which 
immediately followed the rice : the rest was returned 
E2 



66 



PALESTINE; OR, 



into the plate, to serve the next comer to the dish. 
Again he returned to the rice, and again to the fowl 
or the beef ; judiciously alternating layer upon layer, 
handing, mouthing, and swallowing, and hospitably 
inviting us to follow his example, and instructing us 
how to ball the rice, and thrust it into our mouths. 
No ceremony or city civilization here. His brother 
followed at a distance, and did not begin till after much 
intreaty ; but, once engaged, played quite as good a 
fist as Abougosh himself. Thus we all went on eat- 
ing, talking, laughing, and enjoying ourselves, till 
abundant repletion taught us to desist ; then Al 
ham de lelahi, glory to God, we are satisfied, and a 
servant comes round with a pitcher full of water, part 
of which he pours upon our hands ; we wash, and it 
falls into the basin below ; then, having dried, he re- 
ceives the towel, and goes round to perform the same 
ceremony to the next, and thus makes the tour of the 
company." 

64 Next morning, we left our beds at an early hour ; 
but the earliest of the party was preceded by Abou- 
gosh. On quitting the apartment, and going to the 
top of the stair, where a low wall between the two 
houses furnishes a charming prospect of the valley 
below, I found him sitting on his heel in the shade, 
although the sun had scarcely shone on his abode. 
Ke held his pipe in his hand, which he had just taken 
from his Hps, to address a party of his men whom 
he had called around him, and whom, it appeared, he 

was about to despatch on some piratical expedition 

Breakfast was spread on the floor, and orders were 
given to load the camels and the mules. With all 
possible despatch we got ready, and sallied forth from 
the castle of our Arab chief, greatly delighted with 
his hospitality, and not less with the idea of reaching 



THE HOLY LAND. 



67 



Jerusalem in two hours and a half from the time of 
starting. As Abougosh frequently visits Jerusalem, 
the parting scene was nothing more than a simple 
good morning ; he saw us all mounted at the gate, 
and bade us adieu. We had the pleasure of seeing 
him frequently at the Holy City. His brother con- 
tinued to accompany us all the way. 

" The road between Karialoonah and Jerusalem 
presents nearly the same features with that in the 
other parts of the hill country which we had already 
passed. The mountains continued on the right and 
on the left, with here and there a triangular patch of 
low alluvial land, opening into a narrow valley, per- 
vaded by a small stream of water that scarcely covered 
its pebbly bed. We passed the villages of Caglione 
and Lefta, and a small brook trickling down through 
the valley of Turpentine. Having ascended the hill, 
where the road has been formed with considerable 
care, from the ledge of the rock, we passed the vil- 
lage of Abdelcader, the property of our green-coated 
sheikh, on the left, and in a few minutes came in 
sight of Jerusalem, from which we were distant about 
ten minutes' walk of our mules. 

u These plain embattled walls in the midst of a barren 
mountain track, do they enclose the city of Jerusalem ? 
That hill at a distance on our left, supporting a crop 
of barley, and crowned with a half-ruined hoary man- 
sion, is that the Mount of Olives ? Where was the 
temple of Solomon, and where is Mount Zion, the 
glory of the whole earth ? The end of a lofty and 
contiguous mountain bounds our view beyond the city 
on the south. An insulated rock peaks up on our 
right, and a broad, flat-topped mountain, furrowed by 
the plough, slopes down upon our left. The city ia 
straight before us ; but the greater part of it stands in 



68 PALESTINE ; OR, 

a hollow, that opens to the east ; and the walls being 
built upon the higher ground on the north and on 
the west, prevent the interior from being seen in this 
direction. Wf proceed down the gentle descent, covered 
with well-trodden grass, which neither the sun nor 
the passengers had yet deprived of its verdure. The 
ground sinks on our right into what has been called 
the valley of the Son of Hinnom, which at the north- 
west corner of the wall becomes a broad, deep ravine, 
that passes the gate of Yaffa or Bethlehem, and runs 
along the western wall of the city. Arrived at the 
gate, though guarded by Turkish soldiers, we pass 
without tribute or interruption. The rosy counte- 
nance of Abdel Rahman, the brother of Abougosh, 
like a handful of gold, is every where a passport. 
The castle of David, or, to call it by its modern name, 
the tower of the Pisans, is on our right ; on our left 
is a rugged stone wall inclosing a vacant field with a 
pool or cistern. The ruins are at the gates ; but 
nothing of the grandeur of the city appears. We 
turned to the left, where the houses commence on 
both hands, and a few steps brought us to the Latin 
convent of Saint Salvador. The fathers and the 
interpreters, in their robes, immediately came to wel- 
come us to the Holy City : with all possible despatch 
the animals were relieved of their burdens, and we 
with all our effects were accommodated within its 
sacred walls." * 



* Travels, vol. ii. pp. 221—237. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



69 



JERUSALEM. 
Long. 35° 20' E. Lat. 31° 47' 47" N. 

The approach to Jerusalem from Jaffa is not the 
direction in which to see the city to the best effect* 
Dr. Clarke entered it by the Damascus gate, and he 
describes the view of Jerusalem, when first descried 
from the summit of a hill, at about an hour's distance, 
as most impressive. He confesses, at the same time, 
that there is no other point of view in which it is 
seen to so much advantage. In the celebrated pro- 
spect from the Mount of Olives, the city lies too low, 
is too near the eye, and has too much the character of 
a bird's-eye view, with the formality of a topographical 
plan. " We had not been prepared," says this lively 
traveller, " for the grandeur of the spectacle which 
the city alone exhibited. Instead of a wretched and 
ruined town, by some described as the desolated rem- 
nant of Jerusalem, we beheld, as it were, a flourish- 
ing and stately metropolis, presenting a magnificent 
assemblage of domes, towers, palaces, churches, and 
monasteries ; all of which, glittering in the sun's 
rays, shone with inconceivable splendour. As we 
drew nearer, our whole attention was engrossed by 
its noble and interesting appearance. The lofty hills 
surrounding it, give the city itself an appearance of 
elevation less than it really has." Dr. Clarke was 
fortunate in catching this first view of Jerusalem 
under tbe illusion of a brilliant evening sunshine, but 
his description is decidedly overcharged. M. Chateau- 
briand, Mr. Buckingham, Mr. Brown, Mr. Jolliffe, 
Sir F. Henniker, and almost every other modern 
traveller, confirm the representation of Dr. Richard* 



70 PALESTINE; OR, 

son. Mr. Buckingham says : " The appearance of 
this celebrated city, independent of the feelings and 
recollections which the approach to it cannot fail to 
awaken, was greatly inferior to my expectations, and 
had certainly nothing of grandeur or beauty, of state- 
liness or magnificence, about it. It appeared like a 
walled town of the third or fourth class, having 
neither towers, nor domes, nor minarets within it* in 
sufficient numbers to give even a character to its im- 
pressions on the beholder ; but shewing chiefly large 
flat-roofed buildings of the most unornamented kind, 
seated amid rugged hills, on a stony and forbidding 
soil, with scarcely a picturesque object in the whole 
compass of the surrounding view." 

Chateaubriand's description is very striking and 
graphical. After citing the language of the prophet 
Jeremiah, in his lamentations on the desolation of 
the ancient city, as accurately portraying its present 
state,* he thus proceeds : — 

" When seen from the Mount of Olives, on the 
other side of the valley of Jehoshaphat, Jerusalem 
presents an inclined plane, descending from west to 
east. An embattled wall, fortified with towers and a 
Gothic castle, encompasses the city all round ; ex- 
cluding, however, part of Mount Sion, which it for- 
merly enclosed. In the western quarter, and in the 
centre of the city, the houses stand very close ; but, 
in the eastern part, along the brook Kedron, you 
perceive vacant spaces ; among the rest, that which 
surrounds the mosque erected on the ruins of the 
Temple, and the nearly-deserted spot M'here once 
stood the castle of Antonia and the second palace 
of Herod. 

» * Lamentations i. 1^<3 ; ii. 1—9, 15. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



71 



<c The houses of Jerusalem are heavy square masses, 
very low, without chimneys or windows ; they have 
flat terraces or domes on the top, and look like prisons 
or sepulchres. The whole would appear to the eye 
one uninterrupted level, did not the steeples of the 
churches, the minarets of the mosques, the summits 
of a few cypresses, and the clumps of nopals, break 
the uniformity of the plan. On beholding these stone 
buildings, encompassed by a stony country, you are 
ready to inquire if they are not the confused monu- 
ments of a cemetery in the midst of a desert. 

" Enter the city, but nothing will you there find to 
make amends for the dulness of its exterior. You 
lose yourself among narrow, unpaved streets, here 
going up hill, there down, from the inequality of the 
ground, and you walk among clouds of dust or loose 
stones. Canvas stretched from house to house in- 
creases the gloom of this labyrinth. Bazars, roofed 
over, and fraught with infection, completely exclude 
the light from the desolate city. A few paltry shops 
expose nothing but wretchedness to view, and even 
these are frequently shut, from apprehension of the 
passage of a cadi. Not a creature is to be seen in the 
streets, not a creature at the gates, except now and 
then a peasant gliding through the gloom, concealing 
under his garments the fruits of his labour, lest he 
should be robbed of his hard earnings by the rapacious 
soldier. Aside, in a corner, the Arab butcher is 
slaughtering some animal, suspended by the legs from 
a wall in ruins : from his haggard and ferocious look, 
and his bloody hands, you would suppose that he had 
been cutting the throat of a fellow-creature, rather 
than killing a lamb. The only noise heard from time 
to time in the city, i3 the galloping of the steed of the 



72 PALESTINE; OR, 

desert : it is the janissary who brings the head of the 
Bedouin, or who returns from plundering the un- 
happy Fellah. 

" Amid this extraordinary desolation, you must 
pause a moment to contemplate two circumstances 
still more extraordinary. Among the ruins of Jeru- 
salem, two classes of independent people find in their 
religion sufficient fortitude to enable them to sur- 
mount such complicated horrors and wretchedness. 
Here reside communities of Christian monks, whom 
nothing can compel to forsake the tomb of Christ ; 
neither plunder nor personal ill-treatment, nor me- 
naces of death itself. Night and day they chaunt 
their hymns around the Holy Sepulchre. Driven 
by the cudgel and the sabre, women, children, flocks, 
and herds, seek refuge in the cloisters of these re- 
cluses. What prevents the armed oppressor from 
pursuing his prey, and overthrowing such feeble ram- 
parts ? The charity of the monks : they deprive 
themselves of the last resources of life to ransom their 
suppliants.* .... Cast your eyes between the Temple 

* Dr. Clarke draws a somewhat different picture of these holy- 
friars : he describes them, in the first place, as the most corpu- 
lent he had ever seen issue from the warmest cloisters of Spain 
or Italy. Their comfortable convent, compared with the usual 
accommodations of the Holy Land, is, he says, like a sumptuous 
and well-furnished hotel. «« The influence which a peculiar 
mode of life has upon the constitution in this climate, might," 
he add9, f * be rendered evident, by contrasting one of these jolly- 
fellows " (the guardians of the Holy Sepulchre, or, according to 
the name they bear, the Terra Santa friars,) " with the Propa- 
ganda missionaries. The latter are as meagre and as pale as 
the former are corpulent and ruddy." In the commotions 
which have taken place in Jerusalem, the convent of St. Salva- 
dor has been repeatedly plundered ; yet still, the riches of the 
treasury are said to be considerable. The Franciscans complain 
heavily of the exactions of the Turks, who make frequent and 



THE HOLY LAND. 



73 



and Mount Sion ; behold another petty tribe, cut off 
from the rest of the inhabitants of this city. The 
particular objects of every species of degradation, 
these people bow their heads without murmuring; 
they endure every kind of insult without demanding 
justice; they sink beneath repeated blows without 
sighing ; if their head be required, they present it to 
the scimitar. On the death of any member of this 
proscribed community, his companion goes at night, 
and inters him by stealth in the valley of Jehosha- 
phat, in the shadow of Solomon's Temple. Enter the 
abodes of these people, you will find them, amid the 
most abject wretchedness, instructing their children 
to read a mysterious book, which they in their turn 
will teach their offspring to read. What they did 
five thousand years ago, these people still continue to 
do. Seventeen times have they witnessed the destruc- 
tion of Jerusalem, yet nothing can discourage them, 
nothing can prevent them from turning their faces 
towards Sion. To see the Jews scattered over the 

large demands on them for money. " But," remarks Dr. C, " the 
fact of their being able to answer these demands affords a proof of 
the wealth of their convent." Sir Sidney Smith, during his visit 
to Jerusalem, rendered them essential service, which they have 
not forgotten, by remonstrating with the Turkish governor against 
one of these avanias, as they are called, and finally inducing hirci 
to withdraw the charge. Hasselquist states the sum that yearly 
passed through the hands of the procurator of the convent to be 
at least half a million of livres. " The revenues," he says, 
" arise from alms, the greatest part from Spain and Portugal; 
from those people who permit the barbarians to ruin their trade, 
and plunder their country without supplying one piastre for 
their chastisement ; but send yearly a considerable sum to Jeru- 
salem to be devoured by Turks, their inveterate enemies, and by 
monks who are useless inhabitants in Europe, and unnecessary 
at Jerusalem, where they are of no sort of advantage to Chris- 
tianity." 

tart i. r 



74 



PALESTINE; OR, 



whole world, according to the Word of God, must 

doubtless excite surprise. But, to be struck with 
supernatural astonishment, you must view them at 
Jerusalem ; you must behold these rightful masters of 
Judea living as slaves and strangers in their own 
country ; you must behold them expecting, under all 
oppressions, a king who is to deliver them. Crushed 
by the Cross that condemns them, skulking near the 
Temple, of which not one stone is left upon another, 
they continue in their deplorable infatuation. The 
Persians, the Greeks, the Romans, are swept from the 
earth ; and a petty tribe, whose origin preceded that 
of those great nations, still exists unmixed among the 
ruins of its native land." * 

" Jerusalem," remarks another modern traveller, 
" is called even by Mohammedans, the Blessed City 
(El Gootz, or El Koudes). The streets of it are 
narrow and deserted, the houses dirty and ragged, 
the shops few and forsaken ; and throughout the 
whole there is not one symptom of either commerce, 

comfort, or happiness The best view of it is 

from the Mount of Olives : it commands the exact 
shape and nearly every particular, viz. the church 
of the Holy Sepulchre, the Armenian convent, the 
mosque of Omar, St. Stephen's gate, the round-topped 
houses, and the barren vacancies of the city. With- 
out the walls are a Turkish burial-ground, the tomb 
of David, a small grove near the tombs of the kings, 
and all the rest is a surface of rock, on which are 
a few numbered trees. The mosque of Omar is the 
St. Peter's of Turkey, and the respective saints are 
held respectively by their own faithful in equal vene- 

* Travels in Greece, Palestine, &c, by F. A. de Chateaubriand, 
vol. ii. 8yo. pp. 179—183. 



THE HOLY LAND. 75 

ration. The building itself has a light, pagoda ap- 
pearance ; the garden in which it stands occupies a 
considerable part of the city, and contrasted with 
the surrounding desert is beautiful The burial- 
place of the Jews is over the valley of Kedron, and 
the fees for breaking the soil afford a considerable 
revenue to the governor. The burial-place of the 
Turks is under the walls, near St. Stephen's gate. 
From the opposite side of the valley, I was witness to 
the ceremony of parading a corpse round the mosque 
of Omar, and then bringing it forth for burial. I 
hastened to the grave, but was soon driven away: 
as far as my on dit tells me, it would have been worth 
seeing. The grave is strewn with red earth, supposed 
to be of the Ager Damascenus of which Adam was 
made ; by the side of the corpse is placed a stick, 
and the priest tells him that the devil will tempt him 
to become a Christian, but that he must make good 
use of his stick ; that his trial will last three days, 
and that he will then find himself in a mansion of 
glory, &c." * 

The Jerusalem of sacred history is, in fact, no 
more. Not a vestige remains of the capital of David 
and Solomon; not a monument of Jewish times is 
standing. The very course of the walls is changed, 
and the boundaries of the ancient city are become 
doubtful. The monks pretend to shew the sites of 
the sacred places ; but neither Calvary, nor the Holy 
Sepulchre, much less the Dolorous Way, the house 
of Caiaphas, &c, have the slightest pretensions to 
even a probable identity with the real places to which 
the tradition refers. Dr. Clarke has the merit of 

* Notes during a Visit to Egypt, &C, by Sir Frederick Hen- 
niker, bart. 8vo. pp. 274—278. 



76 



PALESTINE; OH, 



being the first modern traveller who ventured to 
speak of the preposterous legends and clumsy forgeries 
of the priests with the contempt which they merit. 
" To men interested in tracing, within the walls, 
antiquities referred to by the documents of sacred 
history, no spectacle," remarks the learned traveller, . 
" can be more mortifying than the city in its present 
state. The mistaken piety of the early Christians, 
in attempting to preserve, has either confused or 
annihilated the memorials it M as anxious to render 
conspicuous. Viewing the havoc thus made, it may 
now be regretted that the Holy Land was ever 
rescued from the dominion of Saracens, who were far 
less barbarous than their conquerors. The absurdity, 
for example, of hewing the rocks of Judea into shrines 
and chapels, and of disguising the face of nature with 
painted domes and gilded marble coverings, by way 
of commemorating the scenes of our Saviour's life and 
death, is so evident, and so lamentable, that even 
Sandys, with all his credulity, could not avoid a happy 
application of the reproof conveyed by the Roman 
satirist against a similar violation of the Egerian 
fountain." * 

Dr. Clarke, however, though he discovers his sound 
judgement in these remarks, has contributed very little 
to the illustration of the topography of Jerusalem. 

* Travels in various Countries, part ii. vol. iv. 8vo. pp. 295, 296. 
Sandys' words are, speaking of the supposititious sepulchre, that 
" those natural forms are utterly deformed, which would have 
better satisfied the beholder, and too much regard hath made them 
less regardable. 

■ Quanto prsestantius esset 

Numen aquae, viridi si margine clauderet undas 
Herba; nec ingenuum violarent marmora tophum. 

Juv. Sat. 3." 



THE HOLY LAND. 



77 



His plan is extremely inaccurate, and his hypothesis 
respecting the site of the ancient Zion altogether 
baseless. It is quite evident that he trusted to his 
recollection in drawing up the account of Jerusalem, 
and that his memory has misled him. By far the 
best account which has been given of the sacred city, 
is that furnished by Dr. Richardson, who, by virtue 
of his professional character as a physician, — a cha- 
racter esteemed sacred all over the East, — was per- 
mitted four times to enter, in company with some of 
the principal Turks in Jerusalem, the sacred enclosure 
of the Stoa Sakhara, the mosque of Omar. With the 
exception of Ali Bey, who passed for a Moslem, 
though really a Spaniard, Dr. R. is the only Frank 
whose feet have trodden the consecrated ground with 
impunity, since the days of the Crusades. A Jew 
or a Christian entering within its precincts, must, 
if discovered, forfeit either his religion or his life. 
Sir F. Henniker states, that a few days before he 
visited Jerusalem, a Greek Christian entered the 
mosque. " He was a Turkish subject, and servant 
to a Turk : he was invited to change his religion, 
but refused, and was immediately murdered by the 
mob. His body remained exposed in the street ; and 
a passing Mussulman, kicking up the head, exclaimed, 
6 That is the way I would serve all Christians.' " 
Before we proceed, however, to enter the Mahom- 
medan holy of holies, by far the most interesting, 
and perhaps the most ancient edifice now standing 
in Jerusalem, we shall avail ourselves of Dr. Richard- 
son's minute account of the modern town. 

" It is," he remarks, " a tantalizing circumstance 
for the traveller who wishes to recognise in his walks 
the site of particular buildings, or the scenes of me- 



78 PALESTINE; OR, 

morable events, that the greater part of the objects 
mentioned in the description both of the inspired and 
the Jewish historian, are entirely removed, and razed 
from their foundation, without leaving a single trace 
or name behind to point out where they stood. Not 
an ancient tower, or gate, or wall, or hardly even a 
stone remains. The foundations are not only broken 
up, but every fragment of which they were composed 
is swept away, and the spectator looks upon the bare 
rock with hardly a sprinkling of earth to point out 
her gardens of pleasure, or groves of idolatrous devo- 
tion. And when we consider the palaces, and towers, 
and walls about Jerusalem, and that the stones of 
which some of them were constructed were thirty feet 
long, fifteen feet broad, and seven and a half feet 
thick, we are not more astonished at the strength, 
and skill, and perseverance by which they were con- 
structed, than shocked by the relentless and brutal 
hostility by which they -were shattered and over- 
thrown, and utterly removed from our sight. A few 
gardens still remain on the sloping base of Mount 
Zion, watered from the pool of Siloam ; the gardens of 
Getxisemane are still in a sort of ruined cultivation ; 
the fences are broken down, and the olive-trees decay- 
ing, as if the hand that dressed and fed them were 
withdrawn ; the Mount of Olives still retains a lan- 
guishing verdure, and nourishes a few of those trees 
from which it derives its name ; but all round about 
Jerusalem the general aspect is blighted, and barren ; 
the grass is withered ; the bare rock looks through 
the scanty sward ; and the grain itself, like the staring 
progeny of famine, seems in doubt whether to come 
to maturity, or die in the ear. The vine that was 
brought from Egypt is cut off from the midst of the 



THE HOLV LAND. 



79 



land ; the vineyards are wasted ; the hedges are taken 
away ; and the graves of the ancient dead are open 
and tenantless." 

The Jerusalem that now is, is still a respectable, 
good-looking town, of an irregular shape, approaching 
to a square : it is surrounded by a high, embattled 
wall, built, for the most part, of the common stone 
of the country, which is a compact limestone. It has 
now, including the golden gate, seven gates. One looks 
to the west, and is called the gate of Yaffa, or Beth- 
lehem, because the road to those places passes through 
it. * Two look to the north, and are called the gate 
of Damascus {Bab el Sham), and the gate of Herod 
(or Ephraim gate). A fourth, looking to the east, 
is called St. Stephen's gate, because near it the proto- 
martyr was stoned to death : it is close to the Temple, 
or mosque of Omar, and leads to the gardens of 
Gethsemane and the Mount of Olives. The fifth 
leads into the Temple, or Haram Schereeff, but is 
now built up, owing, it is said, to a tradition that 
the Christians will take the city by this gate : it is 
called the golden gate. Another gate leads from 
without the city into the mosque of El Aksa, formerly 
the church of the presentation, and is called the gate 
of the Virgin Mary, Bab el Setta Maria. On account 
of a turn in the wall, this gate, though in the east 
wall of the city, looks to the South towards Mount 
Zion : it is not, however, strictly speaking, a gate 
of the city. What, therefore, we reckon the sixth 
gate, is the dung gate, or sterquiline gate. This is 
small, not admitting either horses or carriages (of 
the latter, however, there are none in Jerusalem); 

* This is the pilgrims' gate, called also by the Arabs Bab el Mo* 
garba, or gate of the Maugrabina, 



80 



PALESTINE; OR, 



and from the wall resuming its former direction, it 
looks towards the east. The last is called Zion gate, 
or the gate of the prophet David : it looks to the 
south, and is in that part of the wall which passes 
over Mount Zion. 

The longest wall is that on the north side of the 
city, which runs from the valley of Gihon on the 
west, to the valley of Jehoshaphat on the east. The 
circumference of the area now enclosed within the 
walls, does not exceed, according to the measurement 
of Maundrell and Pococke, two of our most accurate 
travellers, two miles and a half.* The city may be 

• Maundrell says : " I was willing, before our departure, to mea- 
sure the circuit of the city ; so, taking one of the friars with me, 
I went out in the afternoon in order to pace the walls round. We 
went out at Bethlehem gate, and proceeding on the right hand, 
came about to the same gate again. I found the whole city 4630 



paces hi circumferenee, which I computed thus :— • 

From Bethlehem gate to the corner on the right i 

hand !..} «» 

From that corner to Damascus gate 680 

From Damascus gate to Herod's 380 

From Herod's gate to Jeremiah's prison 150 

From Jeremiah's prison to the corner next the\ 

valley of Jehoshaphat / 225 

From that corner to St. Stephen's gate 385 

From St. Stephen's gate to the Golden gate 240 

From the Golden gate to the corner of the> 

wall j 380 

From that corner to the Dung gate 470 

From the Dung gate to Sion gate 605 

From Sion gate to the corner of the wall 215 

From that corner to Bethlehem gate 500 

In all, paces 4630 



" The reduction of my paces to yards, is by casting away a 
tenth part, ten of my paces making nine yards; by which 



THE HOLY LAND. 



81 



roughly stated to be about a mile in length, and half 
a mile in breadth. Pococke accurately describes it as 
standing at the south end of a large plain that extends 
northwards towards Samaria, though it in fact im- 
mediately occupies two small hills, having valleys or 
ravines on the other three sides ; which, to the east 
and the south, are very deep. That on the east is the 
valley of Jehoshaphat ; that on the south is called the 
valley of Siloam, and (erroneously) of Gehinnom ; that 
on the west, which is not so deep, the valley of 
Rephaim. The hills on the other side of these valleys 
are, for the most part, considerably higher than either 
Mount Zion or Acra. On the east, J erusalem is com- 
manded by the Mount of Olives, called Djebel Tor by 
the Arabs. On the south, by what the Christians 
absurdly denominate the Hill of Offence and the Hill 
of Evil Counsel. On the west, by a low rocky flat, 
which rises towards the north to a commanding ele- 
vation : this has been called Mount Gihon. On the 
north-west, Scopo, where Titus encamped, is also 
higher ground than that on which Jerusalem stands. 
So that the Scripture representation of Jerusalem, as 
guarded by mountains, literally answers to its topo- 
graphical situation : " As the mountains are round 
about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about his peo- 
ple, from henceforth, even for ever." * 

The site of the ancient city is so unequivocally 
marked by its natural boundaries on the three sides 

reckoning, the 4630 paces amount to 4167 yards, which make 
just two miles and a half." — Journey from Aleppo to Jeru- 
salem. 

Sir F. Henniker reckoned the regular footpath, outside the 
walls, to be 5320 paces : he performed the circuit in just forty-five 
minutes, and estimates it roughly at three miles. 

* Psalm cxxv. 2. 

F 2 



82 



PALESTINE ; OB, 



where there are ravines, that there can he no diffi- 
culty, except with regard to its extent in a northern 
direction ; and this may be ascertained with sufficient 
accuracy from the minute description given by Jose- 
phus. His account of its topography is, after all, the 
best guide to the modern traveller and antiquary. 
w The city of Jerusalem," he tells us, " was fortified 
with three walls, on such parts as were not encom- 
passed with impassable valleys ; for in such places it 
hath but one wall. The city was built upon two hills, 
which are opposite to one another, and have a valley 
dividing them asunder, at which valley the corre- 
sponding rows of houses on both hills terminate. Of 
these hills, that which contains the upper city is 
much higher, and in length more direct : accordingly, 
it was called the Citadel by king David ; he was the 
father of that Solomon who built this Temple at the 
first ; but it is by us called the Upper Market -place. 
But the other hill, which was called Acra, and sus- 
tains the lower city, is of the shape of the moon when 
she is horned. Over against this there was a third 
hill, naturally lower than Acra, and parted formerly 
from the other by a broad valley. However, in those 
times when the Asmoneans reigned, they filled up 
that valley with earth, and had a mind to join the 
city to the Temple. They then took off part of the 
height of Acra, and reduced it to be of less elevation 
than it was before, that the Temple might be superior 
to it. Now the Valley of the Cheesemongers, as it 
was called, and was that which we told you before 
distinguished the hill of the upper city from that of 
the lower, extended as far as Siloam ; for that is the 
name of a fountain which hath sweet water in it, and 
this in great plenty also. But on the outsides these 
hills are surrounded by deep valleys, and, by reason 



THE HOLY LAND* 



83 



of the precipices on both sides, are everywhere im- 
passable." * 

The Jewish historian then goes on to describe the 
course of the walls. He says, that the beginning of 
the third (or outer) wall was at the tower Hippicus, 
which, D'Anville is of opinion, stood near the south- 
west angle of the present area of Jerusalem. •)• From 
this point it reached as far as the north quarter of the 
city and the tower Psephinus, and then extended till 
it came over against the monument of Helena, queen 
of Adiabene. It then extended farther to a great 
length, and passed by the sepulchral caverns of the 
kings,J and bent again at the tower of the corner, 
at the monument called the monument of the Fuller, 
and joined to the old wall at the valley of Kedron. 
The tower of Psephinus is, by D'Anville, supposed to 
have occupied the site of what is called Castel Pisano, 
or the Castle of the Pisans at Bethlehem gate ; and 
the modern name may possibly be only a corruption 
of the ancient one. It is true, that the citizens of 
Pisa distinguished themselves in the Crusades, and 
had establishments and grants at Acre, Tyre, and 
other places in the Holy Land ; and Paolo Tronci, 
in his Annals of Pisa, claims for two of his country- 
men the honour of having been the first who scaled 
the walls of Jerusalem, when the city was taken by 
Godfrey of Bouillon. But history throws no other 

* Josephus, Jewish Wars, book v. chap. 4. 

t Pococke says: " Herod built three towers on the north side 
of Sion, and gave them the names of Hippicus, Phassclus, and 
Mariamne. The tower Hippicus was at the north-west corner 
(of Sion)." 

X Dr. Clarke reads the words of Josephus thus: " And being 
prolonged by the royal eaves, it bent, with a tower at the corner, 
near the monument," &c. 



84 PALESTINE ; OR, 

light on the origin of the name. This tower, the 
learned geographer understands Josephus to say, 
flanked the north-west angle of the city ; and he 
imagines that the western wall did not extend farther 
north, but turned off toward the east. But the words 
of the Jewish historian by no means imply as much 
as this: on the contrary, the wall evidently extended 
northward, beyond the tower Psephinus, to the monu- 
ments of Helena. The supposition of D'Anville is, 
besides, quite at variance with the representation that 
the ancient city was limited on the western side, as 
well as on the south and east, only by the ravine. 
" This direction of the wall,' 5 remarks Dr. Richard- 
son, " would suit the opinion of those who contend 
that the places shewn as the site of the crucifixion, 
interment, and resurrection, of the blessed Jesus, are 
what they are represented to be ; and this direction 
of the ancient wall of the city appears to have been 
chalked out to meet and support that opinion. I can 
only say, that I saw no vestiges of such a wall re- 
maining, and it would be the most disadvantageous 
situation possible for a wall of defence, for it must 
have been drawn along the low ground almost in 
immediate contact with high ground that would com- 
mand and overlook it, though it were raised to the 
height of twenty or thirty feet, or, in some places, 
forty feet. Besides, it would not make Jerusalem, 
what it is called by the Psalmist, a compact city, but 
a long, narrow strip, slightly fortified by nature on 
the east : which does not correspond to the general 
description, that it was strongly fortified by nature 
on all sides but the north. There is another circum- 
stance, that on the north of Bethlehem gate there is a 
large cistern cut in the rock, which, as legends tell, 
is the place where David saw the bathing Bathsheba, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



85 



and which was probably within the ancient, as it is 
within the walls of the present town. Moreover, to 
the north of this, and to the north of the northern 
wall of the present town, there is another cistern cut 
in the rock, and half filled up with earth, and which, 
I think, was also within the walls of the ancient 
town ; and, in my opinion, the western wall of the 
city stretched along the edge of the ravine, as far 
as it continues, and then passed over to the brook 
Kedron. The city was thus encompassed on the west 
and on the south by the ravine ; on the east by the 
valley of Kedron ; and on the north, as is stated by 
Josephus, it had no protection whatever, but from 
the wall by which it was enclosed, and which, we are 
assured by the same authority, was almost impreg- 
nable. The fortifications were begun by Herod 
Agrippa, and, after his death, the Jews purchased 
from the emperor Claudius, permission to continue 
them, and went on, and completed the walls, to the 
height of thirty-seven feet, and in breadth fifteen feet, 
with great stones of thirty feet long, and fifteen feet 
broad. One part of Titus's army encamped on Scopus, 
a hill at the distance of about seven stadia, or seven- 
eighths of a mile from the city on the north, and 
which derived its name from its elevated situation 
affording a fine view of Jerusalem. Between the hill 
Scopus, and the northern wall of the city, was a 
sloping plain, which was covered with gardens, monu- 
ments, and trees, which were all destroyed ; but the 
ground still answers to the description : generally 
speaking, it is covered with a thin sprinkling of earth, 
and is under cultivation. Another division of the 
Roman army, in which was the tenth legion, which 
came through Jericho, encamped at the distance of six 
furlongs from Jerusalem, at the mount called the 



86 



PALESTINE; OR, 



Mount of Olives, which lies over against the city on 
the east side, and is parted from it by a deep valley 
which is named Cedron. This ground also answers 
the description, and confirms the opinion, that the 
city of J erusalem occupies the same place now that it 
did in the days of Titus ; only that it is not so large, 
and does not cover the whole of the space which it 
did then."* 

The royal sepulchres, which Josephus seems to 
make the northern boundary of the ancient city, lie 
about a mile distant from the present walls, towards 
the north-west. Of this extraordinary cemetery, the 
best account is that furnished by Maundrell and 
Dr. Clarke. 

The first place to which the traveller is conducted, 
on the north side of the city, is a large grot, a little 
without the Damascus gate, said to have been for 
some time the residence of the prophet Jeremiah; 
they pretend to shew as his bed a shelf on the rock, 
about eight feet from the ground ; and the place is 
held in great veneration by both Turks and Jews, 
as well as Christians. In MaundrelTs time it was 
a college of dervises. " The next place we came to," 
that accurate traveller proceeds, " was those famous 
grots called the Sepulchres of the Kings ; but for what 
reason they go by that name is hard to resolve ; for it 
is certain none of the kings, either of Israel or Judah, 
were buried here ; the Holy Scriptures assigning other 
places for their sepulchres ; unless it may be thought 
perhaps that Hezekiah was here interred, and that 
these were the sepulchres of the sons of David, 
mentioned 2 Chron. xxxii. 33. Whoever was buried 
here, this is certain, that the place itself discovers 



* Travels along the Mediterranean, vol, ii. pp. 561—353. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



87 



so great an expense both of labour and treasure, that 
we may well suppose it to have been the work of kings. 
You approach to it at the east side, through an en- 
trance cut out of the natural rock, which admits you 
into an open court of about forty paces square, cut 
down into the rock, with which it is encompassed 
instead of walls. On the south side of the court is 
a portico, nine paces long and four broad, hewn like- 
wise out of the natural rock. This is a kind of 
architrave running along its front, adorned with 
sculpture of fruits and flowers, still discernible, but by 
time much defaced. At the end of the portico, on the 
left hand, you descend to the passage into the sepul- 
chres. The door is now so obstructed with stones and 
rubbish, that it is a thing of some difficulty to creep 
through it ; but within, you arrive in a large fair 
room, about seven or eight yards square, cut out 
of the natural rock. Its sides and ceiling are so ex- 
actly square, and its angles so just, that no architect 
with levels and plummets could build a room more 
regular ; and the whole is so firm and entire, that 
it may be called a chamber hollowed out of one piece 
of marble. From this room you pass into (I think) 
six more, one within another, all of the same fabric 
with the first. Of these, the two innermost are deeper 
than the rest, having a second descent of about six or 
seven steps into them. 

" In every one of these rooms, except the first, were 
coffins of stone placed in niches in the sides of the 
chambers. They had been at first covered with 
handsome lids, and carved with garlands ; but now 
most of them were broken to pieces by sacrilegious 
hands. The sides and ceiling of the rooms were always 
dropping, with the moist damps condensing upon. 



88 PALESTINE; OR, 

them. To remedy which nuisance, and to preserve 
these chambers of the dead polite and clean, there was 
in each room a small channel cut in the floor, which 
served to drain the drops that fall constantly into it. 

" But the most surprising thing belonging to these 
subterraneous chambers was their doors, of which 
there is only one that remains hanging, being left as it 
were on purpose to puzzle the beholders. It consisted 
of a plank of stone of about six inches in thickness, 
and in its other dimensions equalling the size of an 
ordinary door, or somewhat less. It was carved in 
such a manner as to resemble a piece of wainscot ; the 
stone of which it was made, was visibly of the same 
kind with the whole rock ; and it turned upon two 
hinges in the nature of axles. These hinges were of 
the same entire piece of stone with the door; and 
were contained in two holes of the immoveable rock, 
one at the top, the other at the bottom. 

" From this description it is obvious to start a 
question, how such doors as these were made ? whether 
they were cut out of the rock, in the same place and 
manner as they now hang ? or whether they were 
brought, and fixed in their station like other doors ? 
One of these must be supposed to have been done ; 
and whichsoever part we choose as most probable, it 
seems at first glance not to be without its difficulty. 
But thus much I have to say for the resolving of this 
riddle (which is wont to create no small dispute 
amongst pilgrims), viz. that the door which was left 
hanging, did not touch its lintel by at least two inches; 
so that I believe it might easily have been lifted up 
and unhinged. And the doors which had been thrown 
down, had their hinges at the upper end twice as 
long as those at the bottom ; which seems to intimate 



THE HOLY LAND. 89 

pretty plainly by what method this work was accom- 
plished. 

" From these sepulchres we returned towards the city 
again, and just by Herod's gate were shewn a grotto full 
of filthy water and mire. This passes for the dungeon 
in which Jeremiah was kept by Zedekiah, till enlarged 
by the charity of Ebed Melech, Jer. xxxviii." 

Dr. Clarke's description will supply the best com- 
mentary on Maundrell's honest but homely account. 
He describes these sepulchres as a series of subter- 
ranean chambers, forming a sort of labyrinth, resem- 
bling the still more wonderful example lying westward 
of Alexandria in Egypt, by some called the sepulchres 
of the Ptolemies. " Each chamber," he says, " con- 
tains a certain number of receptacles for dead bodies., 
not being much larger than our coffins, but having the 
more regular form of oblong parallelograms ; thereby 
differing from the usual appearance presented in the 
sepulchral crypts of this country, where the soros, 
although of the same form, is generally of very con- 
siderable size, and resembles a large cistern. The 
taste manifested in the interior of these chambers seems 
also to denote a later period in the history of the arts : 
the skill and neatness visible in the carving is admir- 
able, and there is much of ornament displayed in 
several parts of the work.* We observed also some 
slabs of marble exquisitely sculptured : these we had 

* This agrees with Dr. Richardson's brief but more specific 
description, which the reader may compare with the above. 
" The road down to them (the tombs of the kings) is cut in the 
rock, and the entrance is by a large door also cut in the rock. It 
leads into a deep excavation, open above, about fifty feet long, 
forty feet wide, and about twenty feet deep. Heaps of sand and 
earth are piled up along the sides, and the whole has much the 
appearance of a sand-pit. The west end seems to have been orna- 



90 



PALESTINE; OB, 



never seen !n the burial-places before mentioned. 
The entrance is by an open court, excavated in a stra- 
tum of white limestone, like a quarry. It is a square 
of thirty yards. Upon the western site of this area 
appears the mouth of a cavern, twelve yards wide, 
exhibiting over the entrance an architrave with a 
beautifully sculptured frieze. Entering this cavern, 
and turning to the left, a second architrave appears 
above the entrance to another cavern, but so near to 
the floor of the cave as barely to admit the passage of 
a man's body through the aperture. We lighted some 
wax tapers, and here descended into the first cham- 
ber. In the sides of it were other square openings, 
like door-frames, offering passages to yet inferior 
chambers. In one of these we found the lid of a white 
marble coffin (engraved in Le Bruyn's Travels, 1725) ; 
this was entirely covered with the richest and most 
beautiful sculpture ; but, like all the other sculptured 
work about the place, it represented nothing of the 
human figure, nor of any animal, but consisted en- 
tirely of foliage and flowers, and principally of the 
leaves and branches of the vine. 

u As to the history of this most princely place of 
burial, we shall find it difficult to obtain much infor- 
mation. That it was not what its name implies, is 

mented with the greatest care. A cornice, with triglyph, regulus, 
and guttae, passes along the top, and the vine-leaf mantles round 
the decorations. In the south-west corner, a low, narrow door 
leads into a series of chambers, in each of which there is a number 
of excavations, cut in the rock, for the reception of the dead, like 
those which we saw in Malta and Syracuse, all of which are now 
empty, and the place is damp and disagreeable. The innermost 
apartment is adorned above all the rest, and has the mantling vine, 
with clusters of grapes, twined round the pilasters, and inscribed on 
the sarcophagi." 



THE HOLY LAND. 91 

very evident, because the sepulchres of the kings of 
Judah were in Mount Zion. The most probable 
opinion is maintained by Pococke, who considered 
it as the sepulchre of Helen, queen of Adiabene. Be 
Chateaubriand has since adopted Pococke's opinion.* 
Indeed it seems evident, that, by the royal caves, 
nothing more is intended by Josephus than the regal 
sepulchre of Helena he had before mentioned, thus 
repeated under a different appellation. "-(• 

There can be little doubt that this royal cemetery 
was without the walls of the ancient city, but at no 
great distance ; so that Jerusalem must formerly have 
extended towards the north, nearly a mile beyond the 
modern town. With this agrees the description given 
by Josephus of the fourth quarter of the city. " For, 
as the city grew more populous, it gradually crept 
beyond its own limits, and those parts of it that stood 
northward of the Temple, and joined that hill to the 
city, made it considerably larger ; and caused that hill 
which is in number the fourth, and is called Bezetha, 
to be inhabited also. It lies over against the Tower 
of Antonia, but is divided from it by a deep valley or 
ditch, which was dug on purpose." J Taking in, then, 
the site of the new town, or Csenopolis, as Bezetha 

* This is not quite correct. Chateaubriand mentions the opi- 
nion as a plausible conjecture ; bat afterwards urges the text of 
Josephus, cited above, as an objection; and, from another passage 
in the Jewish historian, supposes the caverns to have been the 
sepulchre of Herod the Tetrarch. " Speaking of the wall which 
Titus erected to press Jerusalem still more closely than before, he 
says, that this wall, returning towards the north, enclosed the 
sepulchre of Herod. Now this is the situation of the royal caverns," 
—Travels, vol. ii. p. 108. 

| See note at p. 83. 

$ He informs us, that it was not till the reign of Claudius that 
this quarter began to be enclosed within tlie walls ; but it must have 
been inhabited long before as a suburb. 



92 



PALESTINE; OR, 



was also called, and that part of Mount Sion which is 
now without the walls, we shall obtain an area cor- 
responding to the account given us by historians of 
the extent of the ancient city. Josephus states its 
circumference to have been thirty-three furlongs, or 
little more than four miles ; that is, nearly twice that 
of the modern town. 

Mount Moriah, on which the Temple stood, was 
originally an irregular hill, separate from Mount Zion 
and Acra, as well as from Bezetha. In order to ex- 
tend the appendages of the Temple over an equal sur- 
face, and to increase the area of the summit, it became 
necessary to support the sides, which formed a square, 
by immense works. The east side bordered the valley 
of Jehoshaphat, which was very deep. The south 
side, overlooking a very low spot, was faced from 
top to bottom with a strong wall ; and Josephus assigns 
an elevation of not less than 300 cubits (or 450 feet) 
to this part of the Temple ; so that it was necessary, 
in order to a communication with Mount Zion, to 
erect a bridge across the valley. The west side 
looked towards Acra ; the appearance of which, from 
the Temple, is compared to a semicircle, or amphi- 
theatre. On the north side, an artificial ditch sepa- 
rated the Temple from Bezetha. The Tower of 
Antonia flanked the north-east corner of the Temple. 
It was built on the rock by Hircanus the First, but 
was afterwards strengthened and embellished by Herod 
the Great, who named it after his benefactor, Mark 
Antony. That execrable but magnificent monarch 
is stated by Josephus to have rebuilt the second 
Temple.* According to Josephus, eleven thousand 

* There is reason to suppose that the second Temple was not 
pulled down, but that Herod repaired it, and added considerably 
to its extent. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



93 



labourers were employed on it for nine years ; the 
works were prodigious, and were not completed till 
after Herod's death. To these 44 buildings of the 
Temple," which were probably at the time being 
carried on, the disciples pointed the attention of our 
Lord, when he said to them in reply : 44 See ye not 
all these things ? Verily, I say unto you, there shall 
not be left here one stone upon another that shall not 
be thrown down." * This prediction was literally 
fulfilled. When the Romans took Jerusalem, Titus 
ordered his soldiers to dig up the foundations both of 
the city and the Temple ; and Terentius Rufus, the 
Roman general, is stated to have driven a plough -share 
over the site of the sacred edifice. When the caliph 
Omar took Jerusalem, the spot had been abandoned 
by the Christians. . Seid Eben Batrik, an Arabian 
historian, relates, that the caliph applied to the pa- 
triarch Sophronius, and inquired of him, what would 
be the most proper place at Jerusalem for building a 
mosque. Sophronius conducted him to the ruins of 
Solomon's Temple. The caliph Abd-el-Malek made 
additions to the buildings, and enclosed the rock with 
walls. His successor, the caliph El Oulid, contributed 
still more to the embellishment of El Sakhara, and 
covered it with a dome of copper, gilt, taken from a 
church at Balbec. The Crusaders converted this temple 
of Mahommed into a Christian sanctuary, but Saladin 
restored it to its original use.-f* 

THE MOSQUE OF OMAR. 

Such is briefly the history oi this splendid monu- 
ment of Saracenic magnificence, which the especial 
good fortune of Dr. Richardson, in being allowed to 

* Matt. xxiv. 2. t Chateaubriand, vol, ii. p. 113. 



94 



PALESTINE; OR, 



enter the sacred enclosure, has enabled him to de-t 
scribe. Laying aside his white burnouse, that he 
might not be detected to be a Christian by his colours, 
he put on a black abba of the Capo Verde's, and, 
escorted by a black interpreter, ascended the southern 
slope of Mount Moriah, passed the house of the cadi, 
and entered the Haram Schereeff. " This," con* 
tinues the doctor, " is the name which is given to the 
whole space enclosed about the mosque, and is inter- 
preted to mean the grand or noble retirement for 
devotion. Proceeding forward a few yards, we as- 
cended a flight of steps, and got upon the Stoa Sak- 
hara, an elevated platform, floored with marble all 
round the mosque ; from the door of which we were 
now distant but a few paces. On our arrival at the 
door, a gentle knock brought up the sacristan, who, 
apprized of our arrival, was waiting within to receive 
us. He demanded, rather sternly, who we were ; and 
was answered by my black conductor in tones not less 
consequential than his own. The door immediately 
edged up, to prevent, as much as possible, the light 
from shining out, and Ave squeezed ourselves in with a 
light and noiseless step, although there was no person 
near who could be alarmed by the loudest sound of 
our bare feet upon the marble floor. The door was 
no sooner shut than the sacristan, taking a couple of 
candles in his hand, shewed us all over the interior 
of this building ; pointing, in the pride of his heart, to 
the elegant marble walls, the beautifully-gilded ceiling, 
the well at which the true worshippers drink and 
wash, with which we also blessed our palates and 
moistened our beards, the paltry reading-desk, with 
the ancient Koran, the handsome columns, and the 
green stone, with the wonderful nails. As soon as 
we had completed this circuit, pulling a key from his 



THE HOLY LAND. 



95 



girdle, he unlocked the door of the railing which 
separates the outer from the inner part of the mosque, 
which, with an elevation of two or three steps, led us 
into the sacred recess. Here he pointed out the 
patches of mosaic in the floor, and the round flat stone 
which the prophet carried on his arm in battle ; di- 
rected us to introduce our hand through the hole 
in the wooden box to feel the print of the prophet's 
foot, and through the posts of the wooden rail to 
feel as well as to see the marks of the angel Gabriel's 
fingers, into which I carefully put my own, in the 
sacred stone that occupies the centre of the mosque, 
and from which it derives the name of Sakhara, 
or locked up ; (over it is suspended a fine cloth of 
green and red satin, but this was so covered with 
dust, that, but for the information of my guide, I 
should not have been able to tell the composing 
colours ;) and, finally, he pointed to the door that 
leads into the small cavern below, of which he had not 
the key. I looked up to the interior of the dome ; 
but there being few lamps burning, the light was not 
sufficient to shew me any of its beauty, further than 
a general glance. The columns and curiosities were 
counted over again and again, the arches were spe- 
cially examined and enumerated, to be sure that I 
had not missed or forgotten any of them. Writing 
would have been an ungracious behaviour, calculated 
to excite a thousand suspicions, that next day would 
have gone to swell the general current of the city 
gossip, to the prejudice both of myself and my friend. 
Having examined the adytum, we once more touched 
the footstep of the prophet, and the finger-prints of 
the angel Gabriel, and descended the steps, over which 
the door was immediately secured. We viewed a 
second time the interior of the building, drank of the 



96 



PALESTINE; OH, 



well, counted the remaining nails in the green stone, 
as well as the empty holes ; then, having put a dollar 
into the hands of the sacristan, which he grasped very 
hard with his fist while he obstinately refused it with 
his tongue, we hied us out at the gate of Paradise, 
Bab el Jenne, and, having made the exterior circuit of 
the mosque, we passed by the judgment-seat of Solo- 
mon, and descended from the Stoa Sakhara by another 
flight of steps into the outer field of this elegant 
enclosure. Here we put on our shoes, and turning to 
the left, walked through the trees, that were but 
thinly scattered in the smooth grassy turf, to a house 
that adjoins the wall of the enclosure, which in this 
place is also the wall of the city, and which is said 
to contain the throne of King Solomon. Here there 
was no admittance ; and from thi3 we proceeded to 
a stair which led up to the top of the wall, and sat 
down upon the stone on which Mahomet is to sit 
at the Day of Judgement, to judge the re-imbodied 
spirits assembled beneath him in the valley of J ehosha- 
phat. Descending from this seat of tremendous anti- 
cipation, which, if Mahomet were made of flesh and 
blood, would be as trying to him as his countenance 
would be alarming to the re-imbodied spirits, we 
walked along the front of El Aksa, the other mosque, 
which occupies the side, as the Sakhara does the 
centre, of the enclosure, and arrived at another 
fountain, where we again washed our beards and 
tasted the water. We had scarcely advanced half 
a dozen steps from the cooling wave, when a voice 
from the window of the cadi's house, as it appeared to 
me, called out, Who goes there ? Had I been alone, 
and so challenged, I should have been puzzled for 
an answer, for my tongue would instantly have be- 
trayed me, had I been inclined to counterfeit ; but 



THE HOLY LAND. 



97 



my sable attendant replied, in a tone of surly and 
fearless confidence, 6 Men, and be d — d to you I 
what's your business ? ' The call was from some 
one of the santones of the mosque, of which Omar 
EfFendi is the head ; and hearing the well-known voice 
of his myrmidon, the challenger slunk into his cell, 
and we continued our walk, without further inter- 
ruption, round to the house of the governor, where, 
having made the circuit of the Haram Schereeff, we 
retraced our steps, passed out by the gate at which, 
we entered, and regained the house of Omar Effendi. 
Here I laid aside the black abba, resumed my white 
burnouse, and walked into the room as gravely as if 
nothing had happened. The noble Turk, participating 
in my joy, received me with a smiling countenance, 
made me sit down by his side, and inquired if I had 
seen the Sakhara. I rejoined in the affirmative ; and 
perceiving that the cause of my absence was no secret 
to those who were now assembled around him, I ex- 
pressed my high admiration of its beauty, and my 
sincere thanks to him for having permitted me the 
envied gratification of seeing what had been refused to 
the whole Christian world, during the long period of 
its appropriation to the religion of the prophet, with 
the exception of De Hayes, the ambassador of Louis 
the Thirteenth, who did not avail himself of the per- 
mission. 

" He next proceeded to examine me in detail on 
the different places that I had seen ; and when his 
queries were exhausted, I begged of him to explain to 
me certain terms used by my guide, which I did not 
fully comprehend, and afterwards to explain to me 
the interior of the dome. He regretted that the want 
of light had prevented me from seeing it, and was pro* 
ceeding to supply the defect by a verbal description, 

PART I. Gr 



98 Palestine; oil, 

when his brother, who was sitting on the other side of 
the divan, called out, 4 Why don't you go in during 
the day ?' The question electrified me with joy ; but 
considering it perhaps as a little rash, I looked at the 
Capo Verde before making any reply, when he speedily 
removed all doubt respecting his brother's prudence, 
by converting the query into the imperative sanction 
of 4 Yes, go in during the day.' This was no sooner 
said than cordially accepted, and his brother and 
cousin, each moving his two fore-fingers in a parallel 
direction, said 4 Sava, Sava, we shall go in together as 
a token of friendship and respect.' Several other Turks 
did the same ; for in these countries the friendship of 
the principal person always ensures the officious and 
often troublesome attention of his inferiors and de- 
pendents. 

44 Next day, having previously provided myself with 
a pencil, which a friend was kind enough to lend me, 
1 returned at noon to the house of the Capo Verde, 
which was the time and place fixed for our rendezvous, 
and immediately, in company with four well-dressed, 
long-bearded Turks, repaired to the Haram Schereeff, 
which we entered by the same gate as I had done the 
evening before. 

44 This sacred enclosure is the sunny spot of Moslem 
devotion. There is no sod like that which covers the 
ample area of its contents, and no mosque at all com- 
parable to the Sakhara. Here the god of day pours 
his choicest rays in a flood of light, that streaming all 
round upon the marble pavement, mingles its softened 
tints in the verdant turf, and leaves nothing to com- 
pare with or desire beyond. It seems as if the glory 
of the Temple still dwelt upon the mosque, and the 
glory of Solomon still covered the site of his temple. 
On the same spot and under the same sun the 



THE HOLY LAND. 



99 



memory conjures up a thousand delightful remem- 
brances, and contemplates in review the glorious house, 
the dedication and prayer of the wisest of kings, 
spreading forth his hands in the midst of his people, 
the fire descending upon the burnt-offering and the 
sacrifice, and the glory of the Lord filling the house ; 
with the people bowing down with their faces to the 
pavement, and worshipping and praising the Lord, 
4 for he is good, for his mercy endureth for ever.' The 
spectator forgets that it is a house of foreign devotion, 
and feels as if, in the radiant opalescence of its light, 
an inviting ray was sent forth to the heart of every 
returning Israelite to this ancient centre of prayer. 
There is no reflected light like the light from the 
Sakhara : like the glorious sun itself, it stands alone in 
the world, and there is but one spot on earth, where 
all things typical were done away, that sinks a deeper 
interest into the heart of the Christian. 

" The dimensions of this noble enclosure, as fur- 
nished me by the cousin of Omar EfFendi, are, in 
length, six hundred and sixty peeks of Constantinople, 
that is, about one thousand four hundred and eighty- 
nine feet, measuring from the arch of prayer in El 
Aksa to the Bab el Salam, or gate of peace, which, 
is the name of the gate on the opposite end. In 
breadth it is four hundred and forty peeks, or nine 
hundred and ninety-five feet, measuring from Allah 
dien to the gate Beseri on the west. 

" This spacious square is enclosed on the east and 
on the south by the wall of the city ; through which 
there is only one gate, and that leads into El Aksa on 
the south. There were formerly two gates on the 
east side, and the gate of Tobet, Bab el Tobe, both of 
which are now built up. The other two sides of the 



100 



PALESTINE; OR, 



square are in the town. The west side is enclosed 
by a line of Turkish houses, and is entered by live 
gates ; the north side is enclosed partly by a wall, and 
partly by Turkish houses, and is entered by three 
gates. Having passed in by either of these gates, the 
visitor enters what may be called the outer court 
of the Haram Schereeff, which is a fine smooth, level 
space all round the Stoa Sakhara, falling with a gentle 
slope towards the east, and covered with a thick sward 
of grass, with orange, olive, cypress, and other trees 
scattered over it in different places, but no where 
forming a thicket. 

" In the sacred retirement of this charming spot, 
the followers of the prophet delight to saunter or 
repose as in the Elysium of their devotion, and arrayed 
in the gorgeous costume of the East, add much to 
the beauty, the interest, and solemn stillness of the 
scene, which they seem loth to quit either in going to 
or coming from the house of prayer. In the midst of 
this court, but nearer to the west and south sides, 
there is an elevated platform, which is about four 
hundred and fifty feet square, and is called Stoa Sak- 
hara ; some parts of it are higher than others, as the 
ground on which it is erected is more or less elevated, 
but it may be said to average about twelve or fourteen 
feet above the level of the grassy court. It is acces- 
sible on all sides by a number of spacious stairs, that 
appear to have answered originally to exterior gates of 
entrance into the Haram Schereeff. There are three 
on the west side, two on the north, one on the east 
side, and two on the south : that on the east fronts 
the obstructed golden gate ; it is more worn than any 
of the rest, and much in want of repair. These stairs 
are all surmounted at the top with lofty arches ; some 



THE HOLY LAND. 



101 



of them have four arches, so that one stair leads to 
four entrances into the Stoa Sakhara, and has a most 
magnificent and triumphal appearance. 

44 The platform, or Stoa Sakhara, is paved with fine 
polished marble, chiefly white, with a shade of blue ; 
some of the stones look very old, are curiously wrought 
and carved, and have evidently belonged to a former 
building. There are no trees on the Stoa Sakhara, 
but there are tufts of grass in many places, from the 
careless manner in which it is kept, which afford great 
relief to the eye from the intense glare of light and 
heat reflected from the marble pavement. Hound 
the edge of the Stoa Sakhara, there are numbers of 
small houses ; five of which on the north side are 
occupied by santones or religious ascetics ; one on 
the south is for the doctors of the law to hold their 
consultations in ; one on the west for containing the 
oil for painting the brick and tile for the repair of the 
Sakhara ; the rest are places of private prayer for the 
different sects of Mussulmans or believers, which is 
the meaning of the word. 

" But the great beauty of the platform, as well as 
of the whole enclosure, is the Sakhara itself, which 
is nearly in the middle of the platform, and but a 
little removed from the south side ; it is a regular 
octagon of about sixty feet a side, and is entered by 
four spacious doors. Bab el Garbi on the west ; Bab 
el Shergy, or Bab Nebbe Daoud, or gate of the prophet 
David on the east ; Bab el Kabla, or gate towards 
which the Mussulman turns his face in prayer, on the 
south ; and Bab el Jenne, or gate of the garden, on 
the north. Each of these doors is adorned with a 
porch, which projects from the line of the building, 
and rises considerably up on the wall. The lower 
g2 



102 



PALESTINE ; OR, 



story of the Sakhara is faced with marble, the blocks 
of which are of different sizes, and many of them 
evidently resting on the side or narrowest surface. 
They look much older on a close inspection than they 
do when viewed from a distance, and their disintegra- 
tion indicates a much greater age than the stones 
of the houses, said to have been built in the time 
of the mother of Constantine the Great ; and pro- 
bably both they and the aged stones in the flooring on 
the Stoa Sakhara, formed part of the splendid temple 
that was destroyed by the Romans. Each side of 
the Sakhara is pannelled ; the centre stone of one 
pannel is square, of another it is octagonal, and thus 
they alternate all round : the sides of each pannel 
run down the angles of the building like a plain 
pilaster, and give the appearance as if the whole side 
of the edifice was set in a frame. The marble is 
white with a considerable tinge of blue, and square 
pieces of blue marble are introduced in different places, 
so as to give the whole a pleasing effect. There are 
no windows in the marble part or lower story of the 
building. The upper story of this elegant building 
is faced with small tiles of about eight or nine inches 
square ; they are painted of different colours, white, 
yellow, green, and blue, but blue prevails throughout. 
They are covered with sentences from the Koran ; 
though of this fact I could not be certain, on account 
of the height, and my imperfect knowledge of the 
character : there are seven well-proportioned windows 
on each side, except where the porch rises high, and 
then there are only six, one of which is generally 
built up, so that only five are effective. The whole 
is extremely light and beautiful ; and from the mixture 
of the soft colours above, and the pannelled work and 



THE HOLY LAND. 



103 



blue and white tinge of the marble below, the eye is 
more delighted with beholding it than any building I 
ever saw. 

" The admiration excited by the appearance of the 
exterior was not diminished by a view of the interior, 
the arrangements of which are so managed as to 
preserve throughout the octagonal form, agreeably to 
the ground plan of the building. The inside of the 
wall is white, without any ornament ; and I confess 
I am one of those who think ornaments misplaced in 
a house of prayer, or any thing tending to distract the 
mind when it comes there to hold converse with its 
God. The floor is of grey marble, and was then much 
covered with dust, from some repairs that were exe- 
cuting on the dome. 

" A little within the door of the Bab el Jenne, 
or west door, there is a flat polished slab of green 
marble, which forms part of the floor. It is about 
fourteen inches square, and Avas originally pierced 
by eighteen nails, which would have kept their place, 
but for the amazing chronometrical virtues with which 
they were endowed. For such is their magical temper, 
that they either hold or quit, according to the times ; 
and on the winding up of each great and cardinal 
event, a nail has regularly been removed to mark its 
completion ; and so many of these signal periods have 
already rolled by, each clenched by an accompanying 
nail, that now only three and a half remain, fourteen 
and a half having been displaced in a supernatural 
manner. I was anxious to learn what great event 
had drawn the first nail, the second, the third, and 
so onward in succession ; whether they had taken 
their departure one at a time, or had fled in divided 
portions, as seems to be the fashion now ; or whether 
the sly disappearance of half a nail marked the silent 



104 PALESTINE; OR, 

course of time in the accomplishment of half an event, 
as that of a whole nail indicated the consummation of 
one whole event- But on all these important points I 
could learn nothing ; neither could any one inform me 
when the last half nail took its flight, nor when the 
other half was expected to follow. It is an equally 
recondite matter, known only to the wise in wonders, 
how the nails got into the stone, as how they get 
out of it. Thus much, however, the hierophants 
vouchsafed to communicate, that, when all the nails 
shall have made their escape, all the events con- 
tained in the great map of time will then have been 
unfolded, and that there will then be an end of the 
world, or nothing but a dull monotonous succession till 
the final consummation of all things. My conductor 
also gravely informed me, that underneath this stone, 
Solomon, the son of David, lies buried. All of which 
solemn nonsense it was proper for me to hear, with- 
out appearing to doubt either the information, or the 
source from which it came. 

" The well at the inside of the Bab el Garbe, the 
reading-desk, and the ancient copy of the Koran, 
have been already mentioned ; to which I may add 
the awkward narrow wooden staircase that leads to 
the top of the building : and these comprise all the 
objects worthy of notice that occur between the wall 
and the first row of columns within the Sakhara. 

" There are twenty-four columns in the first row, 
placed parallel with the eight sides of the building, 
three opposite to each side, so as still to preserve the 
octagonal form. They are all of the same kind of 
marble, but rather of a darker hue than that on the 
exterior of the building. Eight of them are large 
square plain columns, of no order of architecture, and 
all placed opposite to the eight entering angles of 



THE HOLY LAND. 



105 



the edifice ; they are indented on the inner side, so 
that they furnish an acute termination to the octa- 
gonal lines within. Between every two of the square 
columns there are two round columns, well propor- 
tioned, and resting on a base. They are from eighteen 
to twenty feet high, with a sort of Corinthian capital. 
I did not remark that it was gilt, which, had it been 
the case, I think I must have done, having specially 
noted that the leaf is raised, and turned over, but 
that I did not consider it the true leaf of the Corin- 
thian capital. A large square plinth of marble ex- 
tends from the top of the one column to the other, and 
above it there are constructed a number of arches all 
round. The abutments of two separate arches rest 
upon the plinths above the capital of each column, so 
that there are three arches opposed to each side of 
the building, making twenty -four in the row of co- 
lumns. The arches are slightly pointed, and support 
the inner end of the roof, or ceiling, which is of wood 
plastered, and ornamented in compartments of the 
octagonal form, and highly gilt ; the outer end of the 
roof rests upon the walls of the building. The inter- 
columnal space is vacant. Not so in the inner circle 
of columns, to which we now proceed. They are 
about two paces from the outer row, and are only 
sixteen in number. There are four large square 
columns, one opposed to each alternate angle of the 
building, and three small round columns between each 
of them. Their base rests upon an elevation of the 
floor, and they are capitalled and surmounted with 
arches, the same as in the outer row : this inner row 
of columns supports the dome. The intercolumnal 
space is occupied by a high iron railing, so that all 
entrance to the holy stone, or centrs of the mosque, is 



106 



PALESTINE; OR, 



completely shut up, except by one door, which is open 
only at certain hours for the purposes of devotion. 

" This central compartment is elevated about three 
feet above the outer floor, and the ascent to it is by a 
flight of four steps. On entering it along with the 
Turks, we found there several rather shabbily-dressed 
ill-looking people engaged in their devotions. One of 
them was a female, of a mean rustic appearance, and 
so extremely stupid, that she was praying with her 
face to the west ; which so provoked one of my con- 
ductors, that he went up and roused her from her 
knees, and having given her a hearty scolding, turned 
her round and made her pray with her face to the 
south, whibh she very obediently did without any 
demur. Within this row of columns the floor is also 
paved with marble, and the blue and white columns 
are so mixed, as in some places to form a sort of mosaic. 
Proceeding on to the right, we came to a round flat 
stone of polished marble, which is raised, high, and 
attached to the side of one of the square columns. 
This stone, I was informed, the prophet carried on 
his arm in battle. It is a ponderous and a very un- 
likely shield. It is broken through the middle, pro- 
bably from a blow aimed at its master by an infidel 
hand. Opposite to this, and on the end of the holy 
stone, which I am about to describe, there is a high, 
square wooden box, with an opening on one side of it, 
large enough to admit the hand to feel the print of 
Mahomet's foot, which he left there, either when he 
prayed or when he flew up to heaven. I put in my 
hand and touched it, to stroke my face and beard, as 
I saw the Mussulmans do. It is so completely covered 
that it cannot be seen. 

u But that to which this temple owes both its name 



THE HOLY LAND. 



107 



and existence, is a large irregular oblong mass of stone 
that occupies the centre of the mosque. It is a mass 
of compact limestone, the same as that of the rock on 
which the city stands, and of the other mountains 
about Jerusalem ; and if I had not been told that it 
is a separate stone, I should have imagined it a part of 
the native rock that had been left unremoved, when 
the other parts were levelled down for the foundation 
of the building. It rises highest towards the south- 
west corner, and falls abruptly at the end where are 
the prints of the prophet's foot. It is irregular on the 
upper surface, the same as when it was broken from 
the quarry. It is enclosed all round with a wooden 
railing about four feet high, and which in every place 
is nearly in contact with the stone. I have already 
mentioned that there is a large cover of variously* 
coloured satin suspended above it, and nothing can be 
held in greater veneration than the Hadjr el Sakhara, 
or the locked-up stone. Under it there is an apart- 
ment dug in the solid rock, which is entered by a stair 
that opens to the south-east. But into this excavation 
I never was admitted, although I was four times 
in the mosque, and went there twice with the express 
assurance that I should be shown into it. However, 
when I arrived, the key was always wanting ; and 
when the keeper of it was sought for, he never could 
be found. They assured me, however, that it was 
very small, and that it contained nothing but robes ; 
and Ali Bey, who having professed himself a Mussul- 
man, visited this excavation, says, that it is an irregu- 
lar square of about eighteen feet in circumference, and 
eight feet high in the middle ; — that in the bottom 
it contains two marble tablets, one of which is called 
the place of David, the other the place of Solomon ; 
two niches, the one of which is called the place of 



108 



PALESTINE; OB, 



Abraham, the other the place of Gabriel ; and, lastly, 
a stone table, Makam el Hodar, which is rendered by 
him the place of Elias ; but the name Hodar was 
always translated to me St. George, as Maharab el 
Hodar, the Arch of St. George ; and though the Mus- 
sulmans frequently confound the two, yet, I believe, 
they never give Elias the name of Hodar. 

" However, this stone has other weighty pretensions 
to the veneration of the Mahomedans than the print 
of the angel Gabriel's fingers or the prophet's foot ; 
for, like the Palladium of ancient Troy, it fell from 
heaven, and lighted on this very spot, at the time that 
prophecy commenced in Jerusalem. Here the ancient 
prophets sat, and prophesied, and prayed ; and as 
long as the spirit of vaticination continued to visit the 
holy men in the holy city, the stone remained quiet 
for their accommodation ; but when prophecy ceased, 
and the persecuted seers girt up their loins and fled, 
the stone, out of sympathy, wished to accompany 
them ; but the angel Gabriel interposed his friendly 
aid, and, grasping the stone with a mighty hand, 
arrested its flight, and nailed it to its rocky bed till 
the arrival of Mahomet ; who, horsed on the lightning's 
wing, flew thither from Mecca, joined the society of 
70,000 ministering angels, and, having offered up his 
devotions to the throne of God, fixed the stone im- 
moveably in this holy spot, around which the Kalif 
Omar erected the present elegant structure. 

64 Having satisfied ourselves with the interior and 
lower part of the mosque, we ascended the narrow and 
comfortless wooden stair to the top of it; and in 
our ascent, had a full view of the immense wooden 
beams that compose the ceiling. The roof of the 
mosque is covered with lead, from the wall to the 
dome. It slopes gently, so that we walked along 



THE HOLY LAND. 



109 



it with ease. The walls rise above it about seven feet, 
so that no part of the roof is visible from the ground 
below. The wall of the dome is round, and the sides 
of the perpendicular part of it are faced up with blue, 
green, white, and yellow painted tiles, the same as the 
upper part of the building. Blue is the prevailing 
colour* It is divided into alternate compartments 
of close and reticulated work; and is covered in at 
the top with lead, the same as the roof of the building. 
It was then undergoing repair. The workmen were 
taking out the old bricks, which were much decayed, 
and introducing new ones, which were painted after a 
different pattern; but all of us thought that the 
old work was better, and the patterns handsomer than 
the new. The scaffolding erected for these repairs so 
obstructed the admission of light into the interior of 
the dome, that I never had a satisfactory view of it. 
From what I saw, it exhibited a faint, but elegant 
display of various colours ; and I was informed that it 
was excessively brilliant, and was ornamented with 
different kinds of precious stones. The height of the 
dome is about ninety feet, and the diameter about 
forty feet. From the roof of the mosque there is 
a delightful view of the city and scenery about 
Jerusalem, in the contemplation of which we remained 
about an hour. 

" Leaving the Sakhara, we proceeded to the Mosque 
el Aksa, the name given to the other house of devo- 
tion contained within this sacred enclosure; though 
a very fine and elegant mosque in the interior, it 
is greatly inferior to it, both in beauty and sanctity. 
It is also called the Mosque of the Women, because it 
contains a separate place assigned them for prayer ; 
and Djamai Omar, or Mosque of the Kalif Omar, who 
used to pray in it. The place in which he performed 

PART I. II 



110 



PALESTINE; OK, 



his devotions is still exhibited. This was anciently a 
church, and in the Christian days of the Holy City 
was called the Church of the Presentation, meaning 
thereby, of the infant Jesus; or of the Purification, 
meaning thereby, of the Virgin Mary. A narrow 
aisle on the right, off the body of the church, is shewn 
as the place where she presented her son in the 
temple. The mosque is in the form of a long square, 
and would answer very well for a Christian church at 
present, were it not for the superabundance of columns 
in the anterior, which assimilate it more to an Egyp- 
tian temple. 

" The Mosque El Aksa lies to the south of the 
Sakhara, and close to the southern wall of the 
enclosure, which is also the wall of the city. It is 
nearly opposite to the Kob el Kebla, which is by far 
the finest door of the Sakhara. Between the two 
there is a beautiful fountain, called the orange foun- 
tain, from a clump of orange trees which grow near 
it. It has seven arches in front, which are slightly 
pointed ; and three square abutments, which support 
the front of the building, look like so many square 
columns. These arches cover a piazza, which affords 
an agreeable walk all along the front of the building. 
The door of entrance is in the centre, and opens into 
the middle aisle of the mosque, which is remarkably 
clean and spacious, and covered with mats. The 
ceiling is flat, and supported by three rows of columns 
on each hand. The two middle rows are round, the 
others are square, and all are surmounted by arches, 
as in the Sakhara, and coarsely finished. Elegance 
is not the boast of this house of Moslem devotion. 
Three large lamps suspended from the ceiling, with 
three burners in each, served to light it up during 
the night. The apartment for the females is enclosed 



THE HOLY LAND. 



Ill 



on the left. At the further end of the aisle, fronting 
the door, there is a large pulpit, which is highly 
ornamented with pieces of variegated marble, as if it 
had formed part of a Christian altar, and adorned with 
two marble columns on each side, and arched over 
the top like an arcade. Standing immediately in front 
of this, we are directly under the Kob el Aksa, or 
dome of El Aksa, which is supported by four large 
columns, surmounted by arches, as in the Sakhara. 
The dome is painted of different colours, and lighted 
by windows in the side. The glass in these windows 
is also painted blue, yellow, red, and green. The 
light admitted through such a medium is softened and 
delightful, and calculated to inspire sentiments suited 
to a place of worship. To the right, near the pulpit, 
there is a small place enclosed with a wooden rail, and 
covered with green cushions, for the cadi. Near 
to this there is a separate place for the singers. 
Up a narrow stone stair, I was shewn a small room 
appropriated to the devotions of the Sultan; but the 
state of disrepair in which it then was, shews that the 
sublime potentate, or his representative, seldom visits 
this place of prayer. On the left, in a direct line from 
the pulpit, there is a long uncomfortable vault, 
in which the Kalif Omar used to pray. Between 
this and the apartment built oif for the females, in 
a recess formed by building up the space between two 
of the columns, there is a niche in the wall at which 
the Mussulmans pray, called the door of mercy. We 
have now completed the examination of the interior of 
the Mosque El Aksa; and here my guide kneeling 
down, performed his devotions, having requested me 
to stand beside him till he had done, when we im- 
mediately sallied out of the mosque, and entered into 
some of the contiguous small houses, where the work- 



112 



PALESTINE; OK ? 



men were engaged in mixing the lime, and preparing 
the plaster for the repair of the Sakhara. Though I 
was escorted by some of the principal Turks of the 
Holy City, yet I easily perceived their anxiety that 
I should be as little observed as possible ; and although 
some of the Moslems whom I met, condescended to 
salute me in a friendly manner, yet others looked 
perfectly savage, and one of them even remonstrated 
with the chamberlain of Omar Effendi for bringing me 
there. 

" Here I would beg leave to remark, that if this 
mosque, El Aksa, be built on the site of Solomon's 
temple, the Sakhara cannot occupy the site of the 
Holy of Holies ; for the two are at a greater distance 
from each other than the whole length of Solomon's 
temple, which was only ninety feet. The door of 
mercy probably occupies the place of the mercy-seat ; 
and the two large granite columns were probably 
exhibited in the days of its Romanism, as the succes- 
sors of the two brazen pillars, Jachin and Boaz, that 
ornamented the porch of the temple of Solomon. 

" From El Aksa we proceeded to the south-east 
corner of the enclosure ; where the keeper having 
unlocked the door, we descended a flight of steps, and 
came into a small square chamber, which is called the 
grotto of Sidn Aisa, or grotto of the Lord Jesus. It 
contains the Sereer Sidn Aisa, the bed or tomb of the 
Lord Jesus, which is in the form of a sarcophagus, 
with a small round pillar erected on each angle, 
supporting a canopy above. The pillars are jagged or 
fretted both at top and bottom, and plain and polished 
in the middle. The bed or sarcophagus is of the 
common compact limestone of the country. It could 
never have been a bath, for it is not capacious enough 
to hold an adequate depth of water, and it is cut 



THE HOLY LAND. 



113 



and formed exactly in the same manner as the 
excavations for the reception of the hodies in what are 
called the tombs of the kings of Judah. The columns 
are of variegated marble, and are apparently of Roman 
workmanship, and seem to have been erected with the 
view of supporting a curtain to be drawn or withdrawn 
according as the object which it covered was to be 
seen or concealed. Why is this square chamber called 
the grotto of the Lord Jesus ? and why is this stone 
trough called the bed of the Lord Jesus ? These 
queries shall afterwards be considered. In the same 
chamber there were three other stone troughs of 
a similar description, but without any columns, which 
were severally denominated the beds of Mary, of 
John, and of Zacharias ; the mother, the forerunner, 
and the father of the forerunner of our Lord Jesus 
Christ : the three persons most particularly indicated 
in the New Testament as connected with the appear- 
ance of the Messiah. And, when we consider that 
Jerusalem, in the early ages of Christianity, was 
entirely a Christian city, perhaps we do not go too far 
in stating, that this grotto and these stone troughs 
were once exhibited by the religious hierophants, as 
the Holy Sepulchre, and the others as the tombs of the 
different individuals whose names they bear. When 
the Saracens captured the city, they took the Christian 
Church of the Purification, the grotto of Sidn Aisa, 
retained the tombs that they found within, and called 
them by the names which the Christians had given 
them, as the Turks still continue to do. 

u From the grotto of Sidn Aisa, we descended 
another flight of steps, and came into what is 
called the Berca Solymon, — a subterranean colonnade, 
raised to support the lower edge of the enclosure 
called Haram Schereeff and a small superincumbent 



114 Palestine; or, 

building, appropriated for the devotion of the sect 
Hambali. The tops of the columns are surmounted 
by arches, the same as those in the Sakhara and El 
Aksa. The columns are about four feet and a half 
square, and consist of three stones each ; each stone is 
about five feet long, and is bevelled at the ends and at 
the corners, so that the joinings form a small niche, 
like revealed rustic. The stones have been remark- 
ably well cut ; but they are much more disintegrated 
than they are likely to have become in the station 
that they at present occupy, during the period of 
eleven hundred years ; and have a much older ap- 
pearance than the arches which they support. The 
style of cutting and joining the stones that we see in 
these columns, is quite different from any other 
architecture in Jerusalem, and from any thing that I 
have ever seen, except in the foundation-stones in the 
temple or castle at Baalbec. The Turks ascribe the 
erection of these columns to Solomon, the son of 
David. We are informed that the inner court of 
Solomon's temple was built of three rows of hewn 
stone, and a row of cedar beams ; and the order from 
Cyrus for rebuilding the temple, mentions three rows 
of great stones and a row of new timber. It is 
not improbable that these columns are constructed of 
the stones above-mentioned : the workmanship, in my 
opinion, is decidedly Jewish. 

M Some of the arches appear to have been giving 
way, and are built up by a solid wall passing between 
the two columns. The different arches are charac- 
terised by different names. One is called the arch of 
Aaron, the brother of Moses ; another is called the 
arch of the Apostles ; and a third is called the arch 
of St. George. There was a small and apparently 
accidental opening, as if the earth had dropped through 



THE HOLY LAND. 



115 



from the haram or outer court of the enclosure. This 
they called the private entrance of Solomon, the son 
of David ; and between the first row of columns and 
the wall on the right, whence I entered the colonnade, 
they shewed me a large slab that covers a stone chest, 
in which Solomon had shut up the devil, because 
he had neglected his orders to bring him his favourite 
queen Belgeess, at a time when he was very impatient 
to see her. I have told the tale as it was told to me, 
and as it is believed by every Mussulman in Jeru- 
salem. The Koran sets forth, that sundry devils 
were under the command of Solomon, to dive to get 
him pearls, and do him other works besides. The 
whole of this subterraneous colonnade is called Habsul, 
or the hidden ; and when we compare the accumu- 
lation of rubbish in other parts of the town with the 
depth of the rubbish in the Haram Schereeff, I think 
there is little doubt that the columns once were above 
ground. They rest upon rock or large coarse stones 
regularly laid. The Turks informed me that there 
are three thousand such columns under El Aksa. I 
saw the stair that leads down to them, but we did not 
enter ; the key could not be found, as was the case 
when we wanted to enter the grotto under the 
Sakhara. 

" Leaving the colonnade, we ascended the steps, 
passed through the grotto of Sidn Aisa, regained the 
open air, and proceeded along the side of the eastern 
wall of the Haram Schereeff to the house which 
contains the Coursi Solymon, or throne of Solomon : 
but still there was no key; and in looking at the 
window, I merely saw the five brass knobs that 
adorned the arms and top of the chair, looking through 
the curtain of green cloth with which it was covered. 
As we passed along to it from the subterraneous 



116 PALESTINE; OK, 

colonnade above-mentioned, we saw, in two places 
where the ground had been turned up, several frag- 
ments of marble columns ; and wherever the sward 
was broken, the ground below exhibited a conglo- 
meration of rubbish of former buildings that had 
anciently adorned this sacred enclosure, now levelled 
and smoothed over for its present use. 

" There are four sects amongst the Mussulmans 
who are accounted orthodox. The first, and at 
present the most respected, is that of the Hanifites, so 
named from Father Hanifah, its founder, who was 
born at Coufah, on the Euphrates, in the eightieth 
year of the Hedjra, and died in prison at Bagdadt in 
the seventieth year of his age. The Turks and Tar~ 
tars, the sultans, kings, and judges, are of this sect. 
The last -mentioned hold public discussions, deliver 
public orations, and are called the followers of reason. 
If a person be liable to any sudden discharge of bloody 
and it should surprise him in the time of his devotions, 
by the laws of the sect he must not wait to finish 
them, but must immediately retire and wash ; and 
when the hemorrhage is stopped, may return and 
conclude his prayers. If, however, he change his 
sect, which he may do to that of Shafei, he may 
continue his devotions notwithstanding the presence 
of his infirmity. Military or naval commanders are 
never of this sect. The elegant mosque of the 
Sakhara belongs to it, and is exclusively their appro- 
priate place of prayer, though those of other sects 
occasionally frequent it. 

" The second orthodox sect of Mussulmans is that 
of Malek, who was born in Medina about the nine- 
tieth year of the Hedjra, and died there in the one 
hundred and seventy-eighth year of the same epoch. 
He is chiefly followed in Egypt, Barbary, and other 



THE HOLY LAND. 



117 



parts of Africa. They have a place of prayer in the 
south-west corner of the Har&m Schereeff. 

" The third orthodox sect is that of Shafei, who 
was born at Gaza, or Askelon, in the one hundred and 
fiftieth year of the Hedjra, was educated at Mecca, 
and died in Egypt in the two hundred and fourth year 
of the same epoch. The members of this sect say their 
prayers in El Aksa. 

" The fourth orthodox sect is that of Hanbal, who 
was born in the one hundred and sixty-fourth year of 
the Hedjra, and died at Bagdadt in the year two 
hundred and forty-one of the same epoch. The place 
of prayer belonging to this sect is in the north-east 
corner of the Haram Schereeff ; but there is none of 
them in Jerusalem at present. They are chiefly con- 
fined to Mecca, though some of them are still to be 
found in Nablous and Damascus. 

" Notwithstanding that each of these sects has a 
separate place of prayer assigned to it within these 
holy precincts, yet, on Fridays, which is the Mussul- 
man's Sabbath, they all pray together in El Aksa, 
and, in the times of their festivals, all pray on the 
platform, or Stoa Sakhara. I do not exactly know 
the particular points in which these four sects differ 
from each other. All are understood to be equally 
orthodox expounders of the Koran ; and I believe 
the principal differences consist in the degrees of 
attention that each thinks it necessary to bestow on 
his person previously to engaging in the ceremonies of 
his religion." 

Father Roger, a monkish traveller, who professes to 
have gained admission into the temple by stratagem, 
assigns a curious reason for the extreme jealousy mani- 
fested by the Turks with regard to any Christians 
setting foot within the enclosure. " If a Christian 
H 2 



118 



PALESTINE ; OR-, 



were to gain access into the court of the temple, what- 
ever prayers he might offer up in this place, according 
to the notion of the Turks, God would not fail to 
grant, were he even solicited to put Jerusalem into 
the hands of the Christians. For this reason, "besides 
the prohibition issued against Christians, to enter not 
only the temple, hut even the court, upon pain of 
being burned alive, or turning Mahommedans, they 
kept a vigilant guard."* Ali Bey says : 66 The Mus- 
sulman religion acknowledges but two temples, that 
of Mecca, and that of Jerusalem : both are named 
El Haram, and both are equally prohibited by the 
law to Christians, Jews, and every other person who 
is not a Mussulman. The mosques in Arabic are 
named El Djammaa, or the place of assembly : they 
are respectable places, it is true, but they are not con- 
secrated by the especial presence of the Divinity. 
Entrance into them is not prohibited to infidels by 
any canonical precept : the people, however, do not 
like to see strangers in them ; nor can the latter enter 
them except by virtue of an order from a public 
authority. For even at Constantinople, Christians 
enter the Mosque of St. Sophia, and the other 
mosques, when they are bearers of a firmaun granted 
by government. But no Mussulman governor dares 
permit an infidel to pass into the territory of Mecca, 
or into the Temple of Jerusalem. A permission of 
this kind would be looked upon as a horrid sacrilege ; 
it would not be respected by the people, and the infidel 
would become the victim of his imprudent boldness. "-f- 
Dr. Richardson was indebted purely to his pro- 
fessional character for his influence with the Capo 
Verde, or Green Turban, the Mahommedan primate 

* Chateaubriand, vol. ii. p. 118. 
f Travels of Ali Bey, vol. ii. p. 215. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



119 



of Jerusalem ; and no other authority than his would 
have been sufficient to ensure him either an intro- 
duction to the temple, or protection. The character 
of the physician is held in such estimation by the 
Orientals, as to partake of a sort of ecclesiastical 
sanctity. He who is a physician, is pardoned for being 
a Christian : religious and national prejudices dis- 
appear before him, and even the recesses of harems 
are thrown open to him. " The physician who visits 
Jerusalem," says Dr. Richardson, 64 may assure him- 
self of a cordial reception, provided he is properly 
recommended ; and the best of all recommendations 
is that of travelling with a family of distinction. 
Both Turks and Arabs and Oriental Christians are 
perfect gluttons in physic, and place greater confi- 
dence in its wonder-working powers than the more 
enlightened people in Europe are disposed to do ; but 
they have been so often gulled by pretenders to the 
art, that a solitary traveller declaring himself to be of 
that profession is looked upon with suspicion, and 
must work his way through lengthened files of gos- 
sipping quacks and anile competitors, fraught with 
legions of nostrums from every country under heaven, 
against every ailment with which the human body can 
be assailed, from a scratch of the finger to a scirrhous 
ulcer or a pestilential boil. But all their clamours are 
silenced by such an introduction ; his prescriptions are 
received with unlimited confidence, and applications 
for advice are without end. Crowds of invalids, 
the halt, the blind, the lame, and the sick of every 
disease, collected from all quarters of the country, 
assail him, so that unless he give his whole time up to 
them, he will find it impossible to satisfy their de- 
mands. It is the hardest of all refusals for a medical 
man at any time to decline giving advice for the 



120 PALESTINE; OR, 

health of a fellow-creature, but more especially so in 
Jerusalem. The patients seize upon him as if only he 
stood between them and death : they fall down before 
him on the ground, grasp his legs, kiss his feet, and 
supplicate him, for the love of God, to look at them, 
and prescribe for their complaints. They rarely pre- 
sent him with silver or gold ; but the father, the 
mother, the sister, the brother, or some friend or 
relation of the patient, stands by with a sheep, a lamb, 
or a goat, a chaplet of beads, a carved shell, or some 
other portion of his property, to reward him for his 
trouble. The soul is touched when the body suffers, 
and any thing for health. Whether he is in his 
lodgings, walks in the streets, or sits down in the 
market-place, the physician is equally beset ; some 
needy sufferer finds him out, and comes up under the 
wing of some favoured Turk, who prefers an unneces- 
sary request in behalf of the invalid : no sooner has 
he prescribed for one, than another victim of disease 
pathetically assails him ; and thus he is kept in con- 
stant employ, and hunted, as if by a dog, both over 
town and country. 

" The medical practitioner who travels in these 
countries, and wishes to be useful, which it is hoped 
every member of the profession does, should take along 
with him a set of surgical instruments, particularly 
such as are necessary for operations on the eye, and 
for laying open fistulous sores ; also a chest of medi- 
cines well stored with calomel and jalap, bark, the 
liquor of ammonia, which, from the debilitated state of 
the digestive organs, occasioned by the excessive use 
of tobacco, he will find of great service ; powders for 
making soda-water, and the spirits of nitrous ether, he 
will find universally called for ; and a small quantity of 
them will be sufficient to secure him the temporary 



THE HOLY LAND* 



121 



friendship of any great man in the country ; he ought 
also to take opium along with him, which, strange as 
it may appear, I hardly ever found good in those 
countries ; and he will find the ointment of the nitrate 
of mercury of great service in the eruptive diseases on 
which he will often be consulted. Such other medi- 
cines as he may have occasion for, he will generally 
meet with in the convents or the shops of the country. 
If it fall to his lot, as it did to mine, he will have 
many eyes to operate upon, and many fistulous sores 
to lay open, most of them arising from neglected gun- 
shot wounds, which are very frequent in those coun- 
tries, where every man who carries a gun may fire it 
almost with impunity at any other man who comes in 
his way." 

On leaving the Haram Schereeff, our favoured tra- 
veller passed out by the gate called Bab el Sette Ma- 
riam, which is close by the gate of the city called 
St. Stephen's gate ; and, turning to the left, pro- 
ceeded along a narrow street, which, in a short time, 
brought him to the Serai, or palace of the governor ; 
an old irregular building, in bad repair, apparently of 
Roman architecture, said to occupy the site of Pontius 
Pilate's palace. The monks pretend to shew in this 
house the very room in which our Lord was kept 
in custody. The palace joins the wall of the Haram 
SchereefF ; and from the south side of it, there is a 
delightful view of the sacred enclosure. A little 
onward is the arch called Ecce Homo, The street 
between the Serai and the church of the Sepulchre 
is the Strada Dolorosa, or mournful way ; which the 
monkish cicerones of Jerusalem gravely point out as 
the way by which our Lord was led to his crucifixion. 
It crosses the road leading to the Damascus gate, and 
then proceeds up an ascent to what is now called 



122 



PALESTINE; OR, 



Calvary ; which is described by Dr. Richardson as by 
no means high, but merely a bluff point on the lower 
slope of the mountain base, as it approaches the edge 
of the lower ground on which the centre of the city 
stands. To the north and west, the rock rises con- 
siderably above it. That is to say, the spot ignorantly 
fixed upon as the site of the crucifixion, so far from 
ever having been without the walls of the ancient 
city, (as, from the Scriptures, we know that Calvary 
was,) is on the lower part of the sloping hill which 
Josephus distinguished by the name of Acra, near 
where it was joined to Mount Moriah by the filling up 
of the interjacent ravine, under the Asmonean princes ; 
consequently near the contre of the city. 85 

* The historical evidence in favour of the supposed identity of the 
sacred places, mainly rests on an assertion of Jerome's (Epist. ad 
Paulinum de Instit. Monac), that " from the time of Hadrian 
to the reign of Constantine, an interval of about 180 years, an 
image of Jupiter marked the site of the Holy Sepulchre, and 
a statue of Venus the place of the Resurrection ; the persecutors 
of the Christians thinking to destroy the faith of the Cross, by 
thus polluting with idols the sacred places." This representa- 
tion, as -Dr. Clarke has remarked, is at direct variance with the 
assertion cited by Chateaubriand from the author of the " Epi- 
tome of the Holy Wars," that Adrian gave the Christians permis- 
sion to build a church over the tomb of their God. Dion Cas- 
sius states, that Adrian built a city on the site of Jerusalem, 
giving it the name of Mlia, Capitolina, and that in the place 
where the Temple of God had been, he erected one to Jupiter. 
Jerome seems to have confounded the site of the Temple with 
the place of the Resurrection. Gibbon says, on the authority of 
Jerome and Tillemont : " Either from design or accident, a 
chapel was dedicated to Venus on the spot which had been sanc- 
tified by the death and resurrection of Christ." There is no 
proof of any such design ; nor could we, on the mere testimony of 
Sozomen, admit the credibility of such an accident. But the 
spot in question, as we have seen, could never have been either a 
burial-place or a place of crucifixion, not being without the 
city. Dr. Clarke supposes that the accidental fissure in the 
rock, which is shewn by the priests as the effect of the earth- 



THE HOLY LAND. 



123 



THE HOLY SEPULCHRE. 

The church of the Holy Sepulchre is built partly 
on the low ground and partly on the ascent. It 
is not entered from the Via Dolorosa ; the traveller 
has to ascend the next street, and then, turning to the 
left, to proceed along a winding descent, till he arrives 
at the large open court in front of the church, where he 
will find every thing his heart can wish in the form of 
crucifixes, carved shells, beads and bracelets, saints 
and sherbet ; all exposed to sale, and the venders 
seated on the ground beside their wares. The court 
is bounded by the wings of the convent : that on the 
right contains Mount Calvary, and other supposititious 
sacred places ; that on the left, the Greek chapel, and 
anciently the belfry. The door of the church faces 
the court ; it is on the side of the building. It is 
open only on certain days in the week, and certain 
hours in each day. To get it opened at any other 

quake, might lead the Empress Helena to fix on the spot now 
called Calvary, as the site of the crucifixion. The mode resorted 
to for discovering the cross, by inflicting tortures on the Jews, 
and the miracle which distinguished the true cross out of the 
three produced by the Jews, which are parts of the tale, betray 
the wretched ignorance and superstition of the principal agents in 
these transactions. Theodoret affirms, that Helena, on her arrival 
at Jerusalem, found the fane of Venus, and ordered it to be 
thrown down. The old lady was then about eighty years of age. 
If such fane existed, (Jerome, we have seen, says merely statua 
ex marmore Veneris,) a sufficient reason would be furnished for 
selecting the place : the pagan edifice, instead of being thrown 
down, would have been doubtless transformed into a Christian 
temple, and the legend be adapted to the locality. In like man- 
ner, the church of the Purification, which occupied the site of the 
mosque of El Aksa, was probably no other, originally, than the 
temple erected by Hadrian to Jupiter. 



124 PALESTINE; OR, 

time, it is necessary to have an order of the two con- 
vents, the Latin and the Greek, with the sanction 
of the governor of the city. When open, the door 
is always guarded by Turks, who exact a tribute from 
all who enter. Once admitted, the visiters may remain 
all night, if they please. The crowd pressing for 
admittance on certain days is immense ; and the 
Turks, who keep the door, treat them in the roughest 
manner, notwithstanding that they pay for admis- 
sion, squeezing and beating them about like so many 
cattle. " It must be allowed," says Dr. Richardson, 
u that they are often extremely riotous, and conduct 
themselves in a maimer very unbecoming their charac- 
ter of pilgrims." 

w Having passed within these sacred walls, the 
attention is first directed to a large flat stone in the 
floor, a little within the door ; it is surrounded by 
a rail, and several lamps hang suspended over it. The 
pilgrims approach it on their knees, touch, and kiss 
it, and, prostrating themselves before it, offer up their 
prayers in holy adoration. This is the stone on which 
the body of our Lord was washed and anointed, and 
prepared for the tomb. Turning to the left, and pro- 
ceeding a little forward, we came into a round space 
immediately under the dome, surrounded with sixteen 
large columns that support the gallery above. In the 
centre of this space stands the holy sepulchre ; it is 
enclosed in an oblong house, rounded at one end with 
small arcades or chapels for prayer in the outside of 
it, for the devotion of the Copts, the Abyssinians, the 
Syrian, Maronite, and other Christians, who are not, 
like the Roman Catholics, the Greeks, and the Arme- 
nians, provided with large chapels in the body of the 
church. At the other end it is squared off and fur- 



THE HOLY LAND. 



125 



nished with a platform in front, which is ascended by 
a flight of steps, having a small parapet wall of marble 
on each hand, and being floored with the same material. 
In the middle of this small platform stands a block of 
polished marble about a foot and a half square ; on 
this stone sat the angel who announced the blessed 
tidings of the resurrection to Mary Magdalen, and 
Joanna, and Mary the mother of James : ' He is 
not here, he is risen, as he said : come, see the place 
where the Lord lay.' Advancing a step, and taking 
off our shoes and turbans, at the desire of the keeper, 
he drew aside the curtain, and stepping down and 
bending almost to the ground, we entered, by a low 
narrow door, into this mansion of victory, where Christ 
triumphed over the grave, and disarmed death of all 
his terrors. 

" The tomb exhibited is a sarcophagus of white 
marble, slightly tinged with blue ; it is six feet one 
inch and three quarters long, three feet three quarters 
of an inch broad, and two feet one inch and a quarter 
deep, measured on the outside. It is but indifferently 
polished, and seems as if it had at one time been 
exposed to the pelting of the storm and the changes 
of the season, by which it has been considerably dis- 
integrated : it is without any ornament, and is made 
in the fashion of a Greek sarcophagus, and not like 
the ancient tombs of the Jews, which we see cut 
in the rock for the reception of the dead ; nor like 
those stone troughs, or sarcophagi, which, I have 
already mentioned, were called to me the beds of the 
Lord Jesus, of Mary, of John, and of Zacharias. There 
are seven silver lamps constantly burning over it, the 
gifts of different potentates, to illuminate this scene 
of hope and joy. The sarcophagus occupies about one 
half of the sepulchral chamber, and extends from one 



126 PALESTINE; Oil, 

end of it to the other. A space about three feet width 
in front of it, is all that remains for the reception of 
visiters, so that not above three or four can be conve- 
niently admitted at a time."* 

That the marble sarcophagus shewn as the sepul- 
chre, has no pretensions to the distinction claimed for 
it, stands in no need of proof. The Evangelists 
inform us that the sepulchre in which the body of 
Jesus was laid, was hewn out of the rock, which 
is not marble, but compact limestone ; a lateral 
excavation, in all probability, of the same kind as are 
still seen in the rocks round Jerusalem. The stone 
in the anti-room of the tomb, shewn as that which 
was rolled to the doorway of the sepulchre, and kissed 
and venerated by the holy fathers accordingly, was 
admitted by the guide, when strictly questioned, to be 
a substitute for the real stone, which was stolen by the 
Armenians,-)- and is exhibited by them in a chapel on 
Mount Zion : but the block of marble, it was said, 
served their purpose equally well. Dr. Richardson 
conjectures that, were the historians of the sacred 
premises to exercise the same degree of candour as 
their guide, it would turn out that the stone trough 
called the Sereer Sidn Aisa by the Turks, was the 

* Ali Bey states, that the Mussulmans say prayers in all the 
holy places consecrated to the memory of Jesus Christ and the 
Virgin, except this tomb, which they do not acknowledge. 
« They believe that Christ did not die, but that he ascended 
alive into heaven, leaving the likeness of his face to J udas, who 
was condemned to die for him; and that, in consequence, Judas 
having been crucified, his body might have been contained in this 
sepulchre, but not that of Jesus Christ. It is for this reason that 
the Mussulmans do not perform any act of devotion at this 
monument, and that they ridicule the Christians who go to revere 
it." 

f Maundrell mentions the fact as then of recent occurrence. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



127 



sarcophagus originally exhibited as the tomb of 
Christ. 

The walls of the sepulchral chamber itself are of 
greenish marble, the species of breccia vulgarly called 
verd-antique. It is pretended that this exterior is 
only a casing to protect the internal surface of the 
rock, which externally has been cut into the shape, to 
use Dr. Clarke's expression, of a huge pepper-box ; all 
the surrounding rock being levelled to the floor of the 
building, except this " grotto above ground," as 
Maundrell terms it. Thus, all that the pilgrim is 
permitted to see, is a marble casing of a supposed rock, 
which rock has, in fact, all the appearance of a build- 
ing, as no doubt it really is. 

From the sepulchre, the visiter is led to the place 
where Christ appeared to Mary Magdalen ; to the 
" chapel of apparition," where he appeared to the 
Virgin ; and then to the Greek chapel facing the 
sepulchre, in the centre of which the Greeks have set 
up a globe, to mark out the spot as the centre of the 
earth ; thus transferring, as Dr. Richardson remarks, 
the absurd notions of their ancient heathen priests 
respecting the navel of the earth, from Delphi to 
Jerusalem. A dark, narrow staircase of about 
twenty steps conducts the pilgrim to Mount Calvary.* 
Here are shewn the place where Christ was nailed to 
the cross, where the cross was erected, the hole in 

* " On what authority," asks Mr. Buckingham, " is Calvary 
called a mount?" Assuredly on no scriptural authority. The 
Evangelists uniformly speak of it as the place (rovcv) called 
Calvary. That gentleman's object is to shew that this may be 
the site of Calvary, though it is not a mount, in which he wholly 
fails; but he is right in supposing that the hill of Calvary, or a 
mount of that name, is a mere figment. It would be a curious 
inquiry, when and how the expression, which has been so implicitly 
received, first originated ? 



128 



PALESTINE; OR, 



which the end was fixed, and the rent in the rock, all 
covered with marble, perforated in the proper places. 
u To complete," says Dr. Clarke, " the naivete of the 
tale, it is added, that the head of Adam was found 
within the fissure." " Mount Calvary" is, by that 
learned traveller, stated to be in fact a modern piece of 
masonry ; a sort of altar, within the contracted dimen- 
sions of which are exhibited the marks or holes of the 
three crosses, without the smallest regard to the space 
necessary for their erection. 

Descending from Calvary, the pilgrim enters the 
chapel of St. Helena, in the low rocky vault beneath 
which the cross is said to have been found. In this 
murky den, the invention (or finding) of the cross is 
celebrated in an appropriate mass by the Latins on the 
3d of May. It is large enough to contain about thirty 
or forty persons, wedged in close array, and on that 
occasion it is generally crowded. The year that Dr. 
Richardson was at Jerusalem, it happened that the 
clay on which the festival was to be celebrated by the 
Latins, was the same as that on which it was to be 
celebrated by the Greeks ; and he witnessed the tug of 
war between the ecclesiastical combatants, who, with 
brick-bats and clubs, teeth and nails, fought for their 
chapel like kites or crows for their nest. The Romans 
were routed. " The devil aids the Greeks," exclaimed 
the superior of the Latin Convent, panting from the 
effects of a blow ; " they are schismatics ; and you 
Englishmen, who live in our convent, see us beaten 
and do not assist us." " How can you expect it," it 
was rejoined, " when, if we fell in your cause, you 
would not allow us Christian burial ?" The Greeks 
spent the night in firing pistols and rejoicing ; and 
were fined by the cadi next morning for disturbing his 
repose. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



129 



The fathers of the Latin convent annually perform 
the crucifixion. Maundrell, who was present on one 
occasion, has given a particular description of the 
dramatic ceremonies. 

" Their ceremony begins on Good Friday night, 
which is called by them the nooc tenehrosa, and is ob- 
served with such an extraordinary solemnity, that I 
cannot omit to give a particular description of it. 

" As soon as it grew dusk, all the friars and pil- 
grims were convened in the chapel of the Apparitions, 
(which is a small oratory on the north side of the holy 
grave, adjoining to the apartment of the Latins,) in 
order to go in a procession round the church. But, 
before they set out, one of the friars preached a sermon 
in Italian in that chapel. He began his discourse 
thus : In questa notte tenebrosa, fyc, at which words 
all the candles were instantly put out, to yield a 
livelier image of the occasion. And so we were held 
by the preacher, for near half an hour, very much in 
the dark. Sermon being ended, every person present 
had a large lighted taper put into his hand, as if it 
were to make amends for the former darkness ; and 
the crucifixes and other utensils were disposed in 
order for beginning the procession. Amongst the 
other crucifixes, there was one of a very large size, 
which bore upon it the image of our Lord, as big 
as the life. The image was fastened to it with great 
nails, crowned with thorns, besmeared with blood ; 
and so exquisitely was it formed, that it represented 
in a very lively manner the lamentable spectacle of 
our Lord's body, as it hung upon the cross. This 
figure was carried all along in the head of the proces- 
sion ; after which, the company followed to all the 
sanctuaries in the church, singing their appointed hymn 
at every one. 



130 PALESTINE; OR, 

" The first place they visited was that of the pillar of 
Flagellation, a large piece of which is kept in a little 
cell, just at the door of the chapel of the Apparition. 
There they sung their proper hymn ; and another friar 
entertained the company with a sermon in Spanish, 
touching the scourging of our Lord. 

" From hence they proceeded in solemn order to the 
prison of Christ, where they pretend he was secured 
whilst the soldiers made things ready for his cruci- 
fixion ; here, likewise, they sung their hymn, and a 
third friar preached in French. 

" From the prison they went to the altar of the di- 
vision of Christ's garments ; where they only sung 
their hymn, without adding any sermon. 

" Having done here, they advanced to the chapel of 
the Derision ; at which, after their hymn, they had a 
fourth sermon (as I remember) in French. 

u From this place they went up to Calvary, leaving 
their shoes at the bottom of the stairs. Here are two 
altars to be visited : one where our Lord is supposed to 
have been nailed to his cross ; another where his cross 
was erected. At the former of these they laid down 
the great crucifix (which I but now described) upon 
the floor, and acted a kind of resemblance of Christ's 
being nailed to the cross ; and after the hymn, one of 
the friars preached another sermon in Spanish, upon 
the crucifixion. 

u From hence they removed to the adjoining altar, 
where the cross is supposed to have been erected, 
bearing the image of our Lord's body. At this altar 
is a hole in the natural rock, said to be the very same 
individual one in which the foot of our Lord's cross 
stood. Here they set up their cross, with the bloody 
crucified image upon it ; and, leaving it in that pos- 
ture, they first sung their hymn, and then the father- 



THE HOLY" LAND. 



131 



guardian, sitting in a chair before it, preached a passion 
sermon in Italian. 

" At about one yard and a half distance from the 
hole in which the foot of the cross was fixed, is seen 
that memorable cleft in the rock, said to have been 
made by the earthquake which happened at the suf- 
fering of the God of nature ; when (as St. Matthew, 
chap. xvii. verse 51, witnesseth) 6 the rocks rent, 
and the very graves were opened.' This cleft, as to 
what now appears of it, is about a span wide at its 
upper part, and two deep ; after which it closes ; but 
it opens again below, (as you may see in another cha- 
pel, contiguous to the side of Calvary,) and runs down 
to an unknown depth in the earth. That this rent 
was made by the earthquake that happened at our 
Lord's passion, there is only tradition to prove : but 
that it is a natural and genuine breach, and not coun- 
terfeited by any art, the sense and reason of every one 
that sees it may convince him ; for the sides of it fit 
like two tallies to each other ; and yet it runs in such 
intricate windings as could not well be counterfeited 
by art, nor arrived at by any instruments. 

" The ceremony of the passion being over, and the 
guardian's sermon ended, two friars, personating, the 
one Joseph of Arimathea, and the other Nicodemus, 
approached the cross, and with a most solemn, con- 
cerned air, both of aspect and behaviour, drew out the 
great nails, and took down the feigned body from the 
cross. It was an effigy so contrived that its limbs were 
soft and flexible, as if they had been real flesh ; and 
nothing could be more surprising than to see the two 
pretended mourners bend down the arms, which were 
before extended, and dispose them upon the trunk, in 
such a manner as is usual in corpses. 

" The body, being taken down from the cross, was 



132 



PALESTINE; OR, 



received in a fair large winding sheet, and carried 
down from Calvary ; the whole company attending, 
as before, to the stone of unction. This is taken for 
the very place where the precious body of our Lord 
was anointed and prepared for the burial, John xix. 39. 
Here they laid down their imaginary corpse, and, 
casting over it several sweet powders and spices, 
wrapt it up in the winding sheet : whilst this was 
doing, they sung their proper hymn, and after- 
wards one of the friars preached in Arabic a funeral 
sermon. 

u These obsequies being finished, they carried off 
their fancied corpse, and laid it in the sepulchre, shut- 
ting up the door till Easter morning. And now, after 
so many sermons, and so long, not to say tedious a 
ceremony, it may well be imagined, that the weariness 
of the congregation, as well as the hour of the night, 
made it needful to go to rest. 

" The next morning nothing extraordinary passed, 
which gave many of the pilgrims leisure to have their 
arms marked with the usual ensigns of Jerusalem. 
The artists who undertake the operation, do it in 
this manner : they have stamps in wood of any figure 
that you desire, which they first print off upon your 
arm with powder of charcoal, then taking two very 
fine needles, tied close together, and dipping them 
often, like a pen, in certain ink, compounded, as I was 
informed, of gunpowder and ox-gall, they make with 
them small punctures all along the lines of the figure 
which they have printed ; and then Avashing the part 
in wine, conclude the work. These punctures they 
make with great quickness and dexterity, and with 
scarce any smart, seldom piercing so deep as to draw 
the blood. 

" In the afternoon of this day the congregation 



THE HOLY LAND. 



133 



was assembled in the area before the holy grave, 
where the friars spent some hours in singing over 
the Lamentations of Jeremiah, which function, with 
the usual procession to the holy places, was all the 
ceremony of this day. 

u On Easter morning the sepulchre was again set 
open very early. The clouds of the former morning 
were cleared up, and the friars put on a face of joy 
and serenity, as if it had been the real juncture of our 
Lord's resurrection. Nor, doubtless, was this joy 
feigned, whatever their mourning might be, this being 
the day in which their Lenten disciplines expired, and 
they were come to a full belly again. 

" The mass was celebrated this morning just before 
the holy sepulchre, being the most eminent place in 
the church, where the father-guardian had a throne 
-erected ; and being arrayed in episcopal robes, with 
a mitre on his head, in the sight of the Turks, he 
gave the host to all that were disposed to receive it : 
not refusing children of seven or eight years old. 
This office being ended, we made our exit out of the 
sepulchre, and, returning to the convent, dined with 
the friars." 

Dr. Richardson was not in Jerusalem in time to 
witness the celebration of the crucifixion by the Latin 
Church, but was present at the service of the Greek 
Church, on their anniversary of the resurrection. 
" The rules of this Church," he remarks, " do not 
permit the exhibition of graven images in their wor- 
ship ; but, as some sensible representation of the body 
of our Saviour was deemed necessary, either in the 
way of mockery or devotion, one apparently lifeless 
was extended on a board, and carried round the sepul- 
chre, with a mighty uproar ; boys and men going 
alongside of it, striking fire from flint. The cere- 

FART I. I 



134 



PALESTINE; OR, 



mony began about eleven o'clock ; the church was 
full in every quarter. The conduct of many of the 
attendants shewed that they entered the holy place 
in a becoming frame of mind ; these sat retired in the 
different chapels or recesses that surround the sepul- 
chre, and were chiefly females. The galleries above 
were also crowded ; many Turkish officers were pre- 
sent. The governor was expected, but did not arrive. 
The mob occupied the body of the house, and their 
behaviour was disorderly in the extreme ; they hal- 
looed and ran about, leaped on one another's shoulders, 
revelling in the most unseemly manner, more like 
bacchanals or unchained maniacs, or a set of rioters 
at a fair, than celebraters of the resurrection of the 
blessed Jesus. Numbers of Turkish soldiers were 
placed in the church to act as constables, and did 
their best to preserve order and decency ; but, notwith- 
standing all their efforts in beating them with clubs, 
pulling and thrusting them about like so many dis- 
orderly animals, the noise and uproar continued till 
about two o'clock, when the grand quackery of the 
day began to be played off by the grand charlatan, the 
Greek bishop of J erusalem ; for, with all possible 
respect for his sacred office, I cannot designate him or 
his exhibition by any other names that will ade- 
quately describe their character. The juggle at- 
tempted to be played off, is usually denominated the 
Grecian fire, which, it is pretended, bursts from the 
holy sepulchre in a supernatural manner, on the 
anniversary of this day, and at which all the pilgrims 
of this persuasion light their lamps and torches, be- 
lieving that they have thus received fire from heaven. 

" Before the ceremony commenced, the higher 
ecclesiastics entered the sepulchre, ^nd in a little time 
light was perceived at a small window in its side.' Thi- 



THE HOLY LAND. 



135 



ther all the people crowded in wild disorder, and lighted 
their torches at the flame, which, from the place where 
we stood, the station of the organ belonging to the 
Roman Catholic church, was distinctly seen to issue 
from a burning body, placed on the lower part of the 
window, within the tomb. This, when some of the 
wicks were of difficult accession, was raised up and 
pushed nearer ; at other times the flame was lowered 
down, and was out of sight, intimating that Heaven 
required to draw its breath, and the fire to receive a 
fresh supply of combustible materials ; when again 
raised up, it burned with greater brilliancy, and, on be- 
coming fainter, was again lowered down as before ; 
which shewed that the priests meant to be very artful, 
and were in reality very ignorant ; for I am sure there 
is not a pyrotechnist in London who would not have 
improved the exhibition. Thus, however, they con- 
tinued raising the light when strong, and lowering 
it when it became faint, till all the torches were 
lighted. No one, like the Druids of old, under the 
pain of excommunication, durst light his torch at 
that of another ; all behoved to be regularly set on 
fire by the flame from the window, otherwise they 
were held in detestation all the year round. As soon, 
however, as this illumination was accomplished, the 
bishops and priests sallied forth from the tomb, and, 
joined by the other ecclesiastics who were waiting 
without in their canonicals, and with torches in their 
hands, all arranged themselves according to the prece- 
dency of their churches, Greeks, Armenians, Copts, 
Syrians, &c. &c, and marched three times round the 
church, bearing their flaming torches high above their 
heads. The effect was particularly brilliant, more 
especially when they passed down or came up from 



136 PALESTINE; OR, 

encompassing the Greek chapel. The torches, by this 
time, were either burnt out or extinguished, and here 
the ceremony closed. The priests laid aside their 
robes and their torches, and the multitude dispersed, 
more convinced of any thing, if they reasoned at all, 
than of the celestial origin of the fire by which their 
torches had been lighted up. Need we be surprised," 
adds this intelligent writer, " that monotheistical 
Moslems deride the Christian devotion, insult them to 
their face, and call them dogs and idolaters ?" 

In Maundrell's time, towards the end of the pro- 
cession, " there was a pigeon came fluttering into the 
cupola over the Sepulchre, at sight of which there 
was a greater shout and clamour than before. This 
bird," he adds, " the Latins told us, was purposely 
let fly by the Greeks, to deceive the people into the 
opinion that it was a visible descent of the Holy 
Ghost." The Latins took a great deal of pains to 
expose the whole ceremony as a most shameful im- 
posture, and a scandal to the Christian religion ; " per- 
haps out of envy," he remarks, " that others should 
be masters of so gainful a business ; but the Greeks 
and Armenians pin their faith upon it, and make 
their pilgrimages chiefly upon this motive ; and it is 
the deplorable unhappiness of their priests, that having 
acted the cheat so long already, they are forced now 
to stand to it, for fear of endangering the apostacy 
of their people." 

It is impossible to calculate the extent of the evil 
resulting from this pernicious mummery, in its two- 
fold character of a delusion on the minds of the pil- 
grims, and a stumbling-block in the way of the con- 
version of the Mahommedans. In the year 1820, up- 
wards of 3000 pilgrims visited the Holy City. They 



THE HOLY LAND. 



137 



consisted of Greeks from Russia, Turkey, and Asia 
Minor, — Armenians, chiefly from Anatolia, — Copts, 
Syrians, and about fifty Roman Catholics from Damas- 
cus. Very few of them were able to read, and scarcely 
one had seen a copy of the Scriptures. The true 
character of their religion may be judged of from the 
fact, that the chief objects of the Greek pilgrims are, 
to obtain candles touched with the sacred fire, under 
the idea that, if burned at a person's funeral, they 
will assuredly save his soul from punishment ; and to 
bathe themselves, and dip their linen in the Jordan, 
bringing these clothes back to be carefully preserved 
for their winding-sheet. " If this be not heathenism," 
it has been remarked, " what is Christianity ?" Every 
friend of his species must devoutly wish that all the 
murky dens and grottoes of superstition, which profane 
and infest the once sacred city, were laid open to the 
day, and the whole system of scandalous imposture 
finally abolished. 

The only genuine objects of interest in the Church 
of the Sepulchre were the tombs of Godfrey of Bouil- 
lon and his brother Baldwin : they are described by 
Chateaubriand as two stone coffins, supported by four 
little pillars, with Latin epitaphs in Gothic character. 
They had nothing to recommend them but their anti- 
quity. Mr. Buckingham states, that they have been 
spitefully destroyed by the Greeks, so that not a 
vestige of them remains. 

The reader must have had more than enough of the 
supposititious sacred places, and it cannot be necessary 
to particularise the absurd legends which affect to 
point out the precise spot on which every circum- 
stance in the evangelical narrative occurred, down to 
the window out of which Dives looked upon Lazarus, 
and the place where Peter's cock crew. Whatever 
I 2 



138 



PALESTINE; OH, 



objects of antiquarian interest Jerusalem may yet 
contain, remain to be brought to light by excavation, 
which, under present circumstances, is impracticable. 
By far the most interesting objects within the city 
are 

THE JEWS. 

The Jews reside chiefly on the edge of Mount Zion, 
and in the lower part of the city, near the shambles, 
which, in summer, are dreadfully offensive. Here, 
again, we shall avail ourselves of the account given 
of the present condition of the Jews of Jerusalem 
by Dr. Richardson. He reports their number to be 
10,000 ; an amazing increase, if, correct, within the 
past thirty years.* 

" Many of the Jews are rich and in comfortable cir- 
cumstances ; and possess a good deal of property in 
Jerusalem ; but they are careful to conceal their 
wealth, and even their comfort, from the jealous eye 
of their rulers, lest, by awakening their cupidity, some 
vile, indefensible plot should be devised to their preju- 
dice. In going to visit a respectable J ew in the holy 
city, it is a common thing to pass to his house over a 
ruined foreground and up an awkward outside stair, 
constructed of rough unpolished stones, that totter 
under the foot ; but it improves as you ascend, and at 
the top has a respectable appearance, as it ends in an 
agreeable platform in front of the house. On entering 
the house itself, it is found to be clean and well fur- 
nished ; the sofas are covered with Persian carpets, 
and the people seem happy to receive you. The 
visiter is entertained with coffee and tobacco, as is the 

* Mr. Buckingham was told, that, previously to the invasion 
of Syria by Buonaparte, a law existed among the Turks, that 
there should be no more than 2000 Jews in Jerusalem, on pain 
of death to those who exceeded that number. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



139 



custom in the houses of the Turks and Christians. 
The ladies presented themselves with an ease and 
address that surprised me, and recalled to my memory 
the pleasing society of Europe. This difference of 
manner arises from many of the Jewish families in 
Jerusalem having resided in Spain or Portugal, when 
the females had rid themselves of the cruel domestic 
fetters of the East, and, on returning to their beloved 
land, had very properly maintained their justly ac- 
quired freedom and rank in society. They almost all 
speak a broken Italian, so that conversation goes on 
without the clumsy aid of an interpreter. 

" It was the feast of the Passover, and they were 
all eating unleavened bread ; some of which was pre- 
sented to me as a curiosity, and I partook of it merely 
that I might have the gratification of eating un- 
leavened bread with the sons and daughters of Jacob, in 
Jerusalem ; it is very insipid fare, and no one would 
eat it from choice. For the same reason I went to the 
synagogue, of which there are two in Jerusalem, 
although I visited only one. The form of worship is 
the same as in this country, and I believe in every 
country which the Jews inhabit. The females have a 
separate part of the synagogue assigned to them, as in 
the synagogues in Europe, and in the Christian 
churches all over the Levant. They are not, however, 
expected to be frequent or regular in their attendance 
on public worship. The ladies generally make a point 
of going on the Sunday, that is the Friday night or 
Saturday morning, after they are married ; and being 
thus introduced in their new capacity, once a year is 
considered as sufficient compliance, on their part, with 
the ancient injunction to assemble themselves together 
in the house of prayer. Like the votaries of some 



!40 PALESTINE; OR, 

Christian establishments, the Jewesses trust more 
to the prayers of their priests than to their own. 

" The synagogues in Jerusalem are both poor and 
small, not owing to the poverty of their possessors, but 
to the prudential motives above-mentioned. 

" The Jewesses in Jerusalem speak in a decided 
and firm tone, unlike the hesitating and timid voice 
of the Arab and Turkish females ; and claim the 
European privilege of differing from their husbands, 
and maintaining their own opinions. They are fair 
and good-looking ; red and auburn hair are by no 
means uncommon in either of the sexes. I never 
saw any of them with veils ; and was informed that 
it is the general practice of the Jewesses in Jerusa- 
lem to go with their faces uncovered ; they are the 
only females there who do so. Generally speaking, 
I think they are disposed to be rather of a plethoric 
habit ; and the admirers of size and softness in the 
fair sex, will find as regularly well-built fatties, with 
double mouldings in the neck and chin, among the 
fair daughters of Jerusalem, as among the fairer 
daughters of England. They seem particularly liable 
to eruptive diseases ; and the want of children is 
as great a heart-break to them now as it was in the 
days of Sarah. 

u In passing up to the synagogue, I was particularly 
struck with the mean and wretched appearance of 
the houses on both sides of the streets, as well as 
with the poverty of their inhabitants. Some of the old 
men and old women had more withered and hungry 
aspects than any of our race I ever saw, with the 
exception of the caverned dames at Gomou, in Egyp- 
tian Thebes, who might have sat in a stony field 
as a picture of famine the year after the Hood. The 



TEfE HOLY LAND. 



141 



sight of a poor Jew in Jerusalem has in it something 
peculiarly affecting. The heart of this wonderful 
people, in whatever clime they roam, still turns to it 
as the city of their promised rest. They take pleasure 
in her ruins, and would lick the very dust for her 
sake. Jerusalem is the centre around which the 
exiled sons of Judah build, in airy dreams, the man- 
sions of their future greatness. In whatever part 
of the world he may live, the heart's desire of a 
Jew, when gathered to his fathers, is to be buried 
in Jerusalem. Thither they return from Spain and 
Portugal, from Egypt and Barbary, and other coun- 
tries among which they have been scattered ; and 
when, after all their longings, and all their struggles 
up the steeps of life, we see them poor, and blind, 
and naked in the streets of their once happy Zion, 
he must have a cold heart that can remain untouched 
by their sufferings, without uttering a prayer that the 
light of a reconciled countenance would shine on the 
darkness of Judah, and the day-star of Bethlehem 
arise in their hearts. 

" The Jews are the best cicerones in Jerusalem, 
because they generally give the ancient names of 
places, which the guides and interpreters belonging 
to the different convents do not. They are not for- 
ward in presenting themselves, and must generally be 
sought for." 

ICHNOGRAPHY, POPULATION OF THE CITY, &c. 

Chateaubriand gives the following statement of 
the ichnography of the city. The three principal 
streets are, haral* bah el hamond (the street of the gate 
of the column, or Damascus gate), crossing the city 

* More properly tarrek, street, harat signifying lane. 



142 PALESTINE; OR. 

from north to south ; souk el kebir, the street of the 
great bazar, running from east to west ; and liarat 
el allam y the Via Dolorosa, running from St. Stephen's 
gate to Calvary. Besides these, he enumerates seven 
other smaller streets : harat el Muslmin, the street of 
the Turks ; harat el Nassara^ the street of the Chris- 
tians, leading from the church of the Sepulchre to the 
Latin convent ; harat el Arman, the street of the 
Armenians, to the east of the castle ; harat el Youd, 
the street of the Jews, in which are the shambles ; 
harat bah hotta, the street near the temple ; harat el 
zahara, the public quarter ; and harat el Maugrabe, 
the street of the Maugrabms. These Maugrabins, 
lie states, are the people of the west of Barbary. 
44 Among them are included some descendants of the 
Moors, driven from Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella. 
These exiles were charitably received in the Holy 
City ; a mosque was built for their use ; and bread, 
fruits, and money, are yet distributed among them. 
The heirs of the proud Abencerrages, the elegant 
architects of the Alhambra, are become porters at 
Jerusalem, who are sought after on account of their 
intelligence, and as couriers are esteemed for their 
swiftness. What would Saladin and Richard say, if, 
suddenly returning to the world, they were to find the 
Moorish champions transformed into the door-keepers 
of the holy sepulchre, and the Christian knights re- 
presented by brethren of the mendicant order ! " * 

The Mussulmans reside chiefly round the hardm 
scher eeff; the Christians, in the neighbourhood of their 
own convents. Those of the Roman Catholic per- 
suasion live near the convent of St. Salvadore, in the 
north-west corner of the city. Those of the Greek 

* Travels in Greece, 6tc. vol. ii. p. 09. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



143 



church reside lower clown the hill, towards the south- 
east, near the small and ruined convent of St. John, 
which is at present occupied by Syrian Christians. 
To the south, and nearly on the summit of Mount 
Zion, stands the Armenian convent of St. James, 
by far the most magnificent in Jerusalem, having a 
spacious walled garden attached to it. The Armenian 
patriarch, a dignified old man, resides in the convent, 
together with the bishop, and a number of the in- 
ferior clergy. The apartments are small, but well 
furnished with sofas and rich Persian carpets. 44 Every 
thing belonging to it," says Dr. Clarke, 44 is Oriental." 
The usual dress of the Armenian clergy is dark blue ; 
they even carry it so far as to wear pocket handker- 
chiefs of the same colour. 44 The dresses in which they 
officiate are the most sumptuous," says Dr. Richard- 
son, 44 1 ever saw, excepting on some of the dignitaries 
in St. Peter's at Rome." Their church is also the 
richest, and largest, and most numerously attended of 
all the Christian churches. According to Maundrell, 
there are two altars set out with extraordinary splen- 
dour, 44 being decked with rich mitres, embroidered 
copes, crosses both silver and gold, crowns, chalices, 
and other church utensils without number. In the 
middle of the church, is a pulpit made of tortoise-shell 
and mother-of-pearl, with a beautiful canopy or cupola 
over it, of the same fabric. The tortoise-shell and 
mother-of-pearl are so exquisitely mingled and inlaid 
in each other, that the work far exceeds the material." 
Mr. Buckingham does not notice the pulpit, but de- 
scribes three altars, fronting the door of entrance ; these 
are, he concurs in stating, as splendid as wealth could 
make them. 44 The church," he says, 44 though small, 
is of a lofty height, and crowned by a central dome, 
and being entirely free of pews or stalls of any de- 



144 PALESTINE; OR, 

scription, looks considerably larger than it really is. 
The -walls are every where covered with pictures 
executed in the worst taste ; yet, from the mere pro- 
fusion of their numbers, and the gayet-y of their 
colouring, they produce on the whole an agreeable 
effect. The pillars both of the church and the offices 
of the sacristy, as well as the portals of the door lead- 
ing to it, and the inner walls, are all cased with 
porcelain tiles, painted in blue with crosses and other 
sacred devices. The mosaic pavement is the most 
beautiful of its kind. The whole is carefully covered 
with rich Turkey carpets, excepting only a small space 
before the great altar. In a small recess on the left 
is shewn the sanctuary of St. James, thought to be 
on the spot on which he was beheaded ; and this is 
ornamented with sculpture in white marble, with 
massy silver lamps, and gilding, and painting, pro- 
ducing altogether a surprising richness of effect. The 
door which leads to this, is still more beautiful, and 
is composed entirely of tortoise-shell, mother-of-pearl, 
gold, and silver, all exquisitely inlaid. "* Hassel- 
quist dwells on the ornaments of this church as 
" well worth seeing, being, past all doubt, the richest 
and most valuable that any church in the East can 
boast of, and perhaps equal to the ornaments of the 
largest and richest Christian churches in Europe. 
The ornaments of the Latins," he says, " are magni- 
ficent, and perhaps in a better taste ; but they them- 
selves own that the Armenians are richer. The 
Greeks in this respect are not to be compared with 
either of them." He tells us that the Armenian 
convent had 1000 chambers for pilgrims, besides those 
.of the monks ; and that not a year passed, but more 



* Travels, vol. i. pp. 370, 371- 



THE HOLY LAND. 



145 



than that number arrived from Armenia, Persia, and 
Turkey, who never leave it without considerable 
alms. ' ' * The disposition of the worthy N atur alist to deal 
in round numbers, however, is shewn by his stating Je- 
rusalem to contain among its inhabitants about 20,000 
Jews. Pilgrims of the above persuasion come in great 
numbers from Constantinople, Armenia, Egypt, and 
all parts of the Levant, to keep the feast of Easter, 
and dip their shirts in the J ordan. 

The Armenians are described by Dr. ft. as " a 
strong, good-looking race of people, highly dignified 
in their deportment, civil and industrious. There 
are many of them settled at Jerusalem in comfortable 
circumstances. Their houses are well kept and well 
furnished. On visiting them, the stranger is received 
with a warmth unusual even among the Greeks, and 
it is the more agreeable for being sincere. He is 
treated with coffee and a pipe of tobacco, a glass of 
liquor, cakes, biscuits, and different kinds of sweet- 
meats, which are handed to him by the mistress of the 
family, her daughter, or servant ; all being usually 
in attendance, although there should be only one guest 
to be served. They take the cup or glass from him 
when he has done with it, and kiss his hand as they 
receive it. They pour water on his hands for him to 
wash after he has done eating, and give him a towel 
to dry them ; on receiving which, they again lay hold 
of the hand and kiss it, and then retire to their station 
with the servant near the door. Mother, daughter, 
and man-servant, are all alike candidates to take the 

* " Three years ago," says Hasselquist (in 1751,) " an Armenian 
from Persia paid for the first fire , (that is, the first to receive the 
sacred fire on Easter eve from the bishop,) 30,000 sequins} a sum 
which perhaps never was given for an answer from the Delphian 
Oracle."— Travels, p. 138. 

PART I. K 



146 



PALESTINE; OR, 



cup and kiss the hand ; and, in point of etiquette, it 
matters not to which of them the guest delivers it. 
They seldom sit down in his presence, and never 
without much entreaty, even though the state of their 
health should be such as to render it improper for 
them to stand ; afraid that by so doing they should 
be thought deficient in respect to their visiter. The 
Armenian ladies have a sedate and pleasant manner, 
with much of the Madonna countenance ; their eyes 
are generally dark, their complexion florid, but they 
are rarely enriched with that soft intelligent expression 
which characterises the eye of the Greek or Jewish fe- 
male." 

The present population has been variously esti- 
mated from 20,000 to 30,000 souls, and can only be 
conjectured : in fact, the numbers are continually 
fluctuating. Dr. Richardson classes the inhabitants 
thus : 5,000 Mussulmans, 5,000 Christians, and 
10,000 Jews. Mr. Buckingham says, the Mahom- 
medans are the most numerous ; but he must have 
been misinformed respecting the number of Jews. 
He was told, he says, by Moallim Zacharias, the 
banker of the governor, and chief of the Jews at 
Jerusalem, that there were not one thousand male 
Jews within the city, but at least three thousand 
females. " No male Jews," he said, " came hither, 
but such as were contented to live poorly, or had 
money to let out at interest for their subsistence, as 
there was no commerce practised in the place ; and 
all, therefore, were either rabbies, or students, or 
devout persons. Widows, however, from all countries, 
if they could get to Jerusalem, were sure of being 
maintained by the community of their own religion ; 
and accordingly, as many as could get together the 
means of doing so, flocked here for that purpose. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



147 



The great happiness of the people," he added, " was 
to die at Jerusalem, and to be buried in the valley 
of Jehoshaphat."* There might be motives for con- 
cealing the real number of the Jewish population. 
If, however, the fixed Jewish population be taken at 
this low estimate of about 5,000, the number may 
very probably be raised by occasional inhabitants to 
10,000. The Mahommedans consist of nearly equal 
portions of Osmanli Turks from Asia Minor ; descend- 
ants of pure Turks by blood, but Arabians by birth ; 
a mixture of Turkish and Arab blood by inter- 
marriages ; and pure Syrian Arabs. Of Christians, 
the proportions are as follow: the Roman Catholics 
consist of the few monks of the Franciscan convent, 
who are chiefly Spaniards, and the still fewer Latin 
pilgrims who occasionally repair thither ; the Greeks 
are the most numerous ; the Armenians rank next to 
the Greeks as to numbers, but far exceed them in 
wealth and influence ; the Copts are reduced almost 
to nothing ; and the other sects, Abyssinians, Maro- 
nites, &c. are lost in the crowd.-]- The period during 

* Buckingham's Travels, second edition, 8vo. vol. i. p. 399. 

t Mr. Jolliffe gives the supposed numbers as follow : 

Jews • • • -from 3,000 to 4,000 
Roman Catholics 800 



In this calculation the Jews and the Armenians are certainly 
under-rated ; the Latins and Mussulmen are over-estimated. Mr. 
Jolliffe's information was confessedly drawn from very imperfect 
sources ; probably the Christians ; Mr. Buckingham's informant 
was a Jew ; Dr. Richardson's was Turkish authority. This may 
partly explain the variations. 



Greeks 

Armenians 

Copts 

Mahommedans 



2,000 
400 
50 
13,000 



20,250 



148 



PALESTINE; OR, 



which the city is most populous, is from Christmas to 
Easter : at the latter festival, it is crowded, and the 
spectacle of the motley population is such as can scarcely 
be paralleled. 

BEAD AND RELIC TRADE. 

In Jerusalem, there is scarcely any trade, and but 
few manufactures : the only nourishing one is that of 
crucifixes, chaplets, beads, shells, and relics, of which 
whole cargoes are shipped from Jaffa, for Italy, Spain, 
and Portugal.* The shells are of the kind called 
mother-of-pearl, ingeniously though coarsely sculp- 
tured into various shapes. Those of the largest size, 
and the most perfect, are formed into clasps for the 
zones of the Greek women. Such clasps are worn by 
the ladies of Cyprus, Crete, Rhodes, and other islands 
of the Archipelago. All these, after being purchased, 
are taken to the church of St. Sepulchre, where they 
undergo the process of benediction or consecration, 
and are then fit for use. In like manner, beads and 
crosses purchased at Loretto, are placed in a wooden 
bowl belonging to the house of the Virgin, to be con- 
secrated for the purpose of being worn as amulets. -f- 
The beads are manufactured either from date stones, 
or from a very hard kind of wood called Mecca fruit : 
when first wrought, it appears of the colour of box ; 
it is then dyed yellow, black, or red. They are of 
various sizes ; the smaller are the most esteemed, on 
account of the greater number used to fill a string ; 
and rosaries sell at higher prices when they have been 
long worn, because the beads acquire a polish by 

* Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 6. Clarke's Travels, vol. ir. 
p. 306. 

t Clarke's Travels, vol. iv. 8vo. p. 204. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



149 



friction. Strings of beads are in request equally 
among the Moslems and the Christians. The custom 
of carrying them appears to have been in use long 
before the Christian era, and still prevails in the 
East. This is but one instance among many, of the 
Heathen origin of the Romish customs. The shell 
worn as a badge by pilgrims had probably a similar 
origin : it was an ancient symbol of Astarte, the 
Syrian Venus. Rosaries and amulets are made also of 
the black fetid lime-stone of the Dead Sea, to be worn 
as a charm against the plague. Amulets of the same 
mineral substance have been found in the chambers 
below the pyramids of Sakhara, in Upper Egypt : the 
effluvia is owing to the presence of sulphuretted hydro- 
gen. The Armenians and the Jews are the chief 
traders in these sacred wares. 

The local government of Jerusalem consists of the 
Tnozallam, or military governor ; the moula cadi, or 
chief of the police ; the mufti, the head of the eccle- 
siastical and judicial departments ; the capo verde, or 
agent for the mosque of Omar ; and the soubaski, or 
town-major. All these, with the exception of the 
mufti, hold their appointment at the pleasure of the 
pacha of Damascus. 

MOUNT SION. 

The Armenian convent, with its church and gar- 
dens, occupies the whole of that part of Mount Sion 
which is now within the walls : the greater part, is 
now excluded from the city; and for the best descrip- 
tion of this interesting site, we must avail ourselves of 
Dr. Richardson's Travels. 

" Passing out by Zion gate, or, as it is more fre- 
quently denominated, the gate of David, the first 



150 PALESTINE; OE, 

object that meets the eye of the traveller, is a long 
dingy-looking Turkish mosque, situated on the middle 
of Mount Zion. It is called the mosque of the pro- 
phet David, and is said to be built over his tomb, 
which is still exhibited in the interior, and is held in 
the greatest possible veneration by the Mussulmans. 
The Santones belonging to the mosque in Mount 
Zion, are the most powerful in Jerusalem. Part of 
this building was anciently the church of the Coena- 
culum, where our Saviour ate the last supper with 
his disciples ; and I was shewn into an upper room 
in the front of the building, which both the Santon 
and the Ciceroni affirmed to be the identical room in 
which this memorable event, to which the Christian 
world owes the institution of the Holy Sacrament of 
the Supper, took place. I should probably have be- 
lieved them, had I not learnt from higher authority, 
that, thirty-nine years thereafter, not only the walls, 
but every house in Jerusalem, had been rased from its 
foundations, and the ground ploughed up by the Ro- 
man soldiers, in order that they might discover the 
treasures which they supposed the unfortunate Jews 
had hidden under their feet. 

" To the right of the mosque, and between it and 
the gate of the city, there is a small Armenian chapel, 
built on the spot where formerly stood the palace 
of Caiaphas. It is remarkable for nothing but that 
the stone which closed up the door of the holy sepul- 
chre, is built in an altar at the upper end of it, 
and exposed in several places to be kissed and caressed, 
like other precious relics. It is an unpolished block 
of compact lime-stone, the same with the rock on 
which the city stands, and does not, like the block 
of polished marble in present use, carry in its face 
the refutation of its once having served the office 



THE HOLY LAND. 



151 



assigned to it, though I confess there is almost as little 
probability that it ever did. 

" A few paces to the west of the chapel, there is a 
Christian burying-ground ; and among the lettered 
tomb-stones are several inscribed in the language of 
our own country. They record the names, and cover 
the ashes of Englishmen, who are reported to have met 
their deaths in a way not very creditable to the Fran- 
ciscan convent. A little to the south of this is shewn 
the place where the Virgin Mary expired ; and on the 
north side of the gate is shewn — what ? The place 
where the cock crew to Peter. 

" Such is the sum total of the information which 
the traveller receives from his guide respecting the 
topography of this interesting spot, Mount Zion. 
At the time when I visited this sacred ground, one 
part of it supported a crop of barley, another was 
undergoing the labour of the plough, and the soil 
turned up consisted of stone and lime mixed with 
earth, such as is usually met with in the foundations 
of mined cities. It is nearly a mile in circumference, 
is highest on the west side, and towards the east 
falls down in broad terraces on the upper part of the 
mountain, and narrow ones on the side, as it slopes 
down towards the brook Kedron. Each terrace is 
divided from the one above it by a low wall of dry 
stone, built of the ruins of this celebrated spot. The 
terraces near the bottom of the hill are still used as 
gardens, and are watered from the pool of Siloam. 
They belong chiefly to the inhabitants of the small 
village of Siloa immediately opposite. We have here 
another remarkable instance of the special fulfilment 
of prophecy : ' Therefore shall Zion for your sakes be 
ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps/ 
— Micah iii. 12. 



152 



PALESTINE; OK, 



" Mount Zion is considerably higher than the 
ground on the north, on which the ancient city 
stood, or that on the east leading on to the valley 
of Jehoshaphat, but has very little relative height 
above the ground on the south and on the west, and 
must have owed its boasted strength principally to 
a deep ravine, by which it is encompassed on the 
east, south, and west, and the strong high walls and 
towers by which it was enclosed and flanked com- 
pletely round. This ravine, or valley, as the term 
has been rendered, though the word trench or ditch 
would have conveyed a more correct idea of its ap- 
pearance, seems to have been formed by art on the 
south and on the west, the surface of the ground on 
each side being nearly of equal height, though Mount 
Zion is certainly the highest, yet so little so that it 
could not have derived much additional strength from 
its elevation. The breadth of this ditch is stated by 
Strabo, to be about 150 feet, and its depth, or the 
height of Mount Zion above the bottom of the ravine, 
to be about sixty feet. The measurement, in both 
instances, is nearly correct, and furnishes one among 
many proofs that we derive from other sources, that 
the places now called by these names are the same 
as those that were anciently so denominated. The 
bottom of this ravine is rock, covered with a thin 
sprinkling of earth, and, in the winter season, is the 
natural channel for conveying off the water that falls 
into it from the higher ground ; but, on both sides, 
the rock is cut perpendicularly down, and most pro- 
bably it was the quarry from which the greater part 
of the stones were taken for building the city. The 
precipitous edge of the ravine is more covered with 
earth on the side of Mount Zion than on the other 
side, which is probably owing to the barbarous custom 



THE HOLY LAND. 



153 



oi razing cities from their foundations, and tumbling 
both earth and stone into the ditch below. The loose 
stones have been all removed from it for building the 
present city. This ravine extends further north than 
the present wall of the city, and ends in a gradual 
slope of deep earth, so as to countenance the opinion 
that it once extended further than it does now." 

PLACES WITHOUT THE WALLS OF JERUSALEM. 

It only remains to describe the objects of anti- 
quarian curiosity, which present themselves without 
the walls of modern Jerusalem. We have by antici- 
pation described the royal sepulchres, which lie to the 
north, in examining the boundaries of the ancient 
city. Before we descend into the valley of Jehosha- 
phat, we must stop to notice, close by St. Stephen's 
gate, the supposed remains of the pool of Bethesda. 
Maundrell gives the measurement — 120 paces long, 
forty broad, and at least eight deep ; but, he adds, 
void of water. " At its west end it discovers some 
old arches, now dammed up. These, some will have 
to be the five porches in which sate that multitude 
of lame, halt, and blind. (John v.) But the mischief 
is, instead of five, there are but three of them." 
Pococke, in speaking of the same place, makes the 
following sensible remarks : " There seems to have 
been a deep fossee to the north of Mount Moriah," 
(by which no doubt it was divided from Bezetha,) " the 
east part of which is still to be seen, and is called by 
the monks the pool of Bethesda. At the east end of 
it, at the entrance to the court of the temple, are 
remains of some buildings of very large hewn stone, 
particularly an entablature in a good taste, which 
might be part of an entrance that Hadrian might 
have made to his new grove. If this fossee was car- 

K 2 

i 



154 PALESTINE; OR, 

ried all along to the north of Mount Moriah, it must 
have passed where the house of Pilate is now shewn, 
which part might be filled up with the ruins of the 
Temple. If the Christians, when they had possession 
of Jerusalem, had dug here and in other parts, 
especially to the east of the Temple, and to the south 
of Mount Zion, they might, without doubt, have 
found great remains of the materials of the Temple 
and of the palaces on Mount Zion, and probably have 
been able to pass some judgement on the architecture 
of them. This fossee does not seem to be the pool 
of Bethesda, which, by all accounts, must have been 
to the south, or about the south-west of Mount 
Moriah. In St. Jerome's time, there were two pools, 
one filled by the rain ; the other was of reddish water, 
as if it retained the colour of the sacrifices ; and I 
suppose it was about the gardens to the south of the 
church of the purification, which is within the site 
of the court of the Temple ; and the quarter called 
Ophel was also probably in this part of the city. For 
it was at the south corner of the Temple, where the 
Nethinims lived, who had the care of the sacrifices, 
and might extend to the north part of the hill or 
valley." * 

Descending into the valley from St. Stephen's gate, 
the traveller comes to the bed of the brook Kedron, 
which is but a few paces over. This brook is stated 
by Pococke, to have its rise a little way further to 
the north, but its source does not appear to have been 
ascertained. Like the Ilissus, it is dry at least nine 
months in the year ; its bed is narrow and deep, 
which indicates that it must formerly have been the 
channel for waters that have found some other and 



* Pococke's Travels^ book i. chap. 3. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



155 



probably subterranean course. There is now no water 
in it, except after heavy rains. A bridge is thrown 
over it a little below the gate of St. Stephen ; and 
they say, that when there is water, unless the torrent 
swells much, which very rarely occurs, it all runs 
under ground to the north of this bridge. The course 
of the brook is along the valley of Jehoshaphat, to 
the south-west corner of the city, and, then, turning 
to the south, it runs to the Dead Sea. 

Passing over this bridge, a descent of several steps 
to the left conducts the traveller to the sepulchre of 
the Blessed Virgin ; a lofty and spacious vault or cave, 
(Chateaubriand terms it a subterraneous church,) 
hewn with surprising labour in a stratum of hard 
compact lime-stone, and there can be no doubt that 
the persons here interred, must have been held in 
high veneration, or of distinguished rank. Neither 
Eusebius, Epiphanius, nor Jerome, however, mentions 
a syllable to authorise the tradition. The earliest 
notice of this sepulchre as that of the Virgin, occurs 
in the writings of Adamnanus, the Irish monk, who 
described it from the testimony of Arculfus, in the 
seventh century ; and it is mentioned by another 
writer, who lived in the beginning of the eighth.* 
These are authorities undeserving of attention, when 
opposed to the negative evidence supplied by the 
silence of the above-mentioned writers, and the high 
improbability that, at the period of the Virgin's death, 
the early Christians should have had it in their power 
to pay this magnificent tribute of veneration for her 
memory.-)* Pococke, upon the authority of authors 

* Clarke's Travels, 8vo. vol. iv. chap. 8. p. 368. 

t Chateaubriand says : " Though Mary did not die at Jeru- 
salem, yet, according to the opinion of several of the fathers, she 
was miraculously buried at Gethsemane by the apostles. Enthy- 



156 



PALESTINE; OE, 



whom he has not named, thinks it probable that it 
was the sepulchre of Melisendis, queen of Jerusalem, 
You descend to it by a flight of fifty (Maundrell says 
forty-seven) marble steps, each step twenty feet wide : 
these are conjectured by Dr. Clarke to be of less high 
antiquity than the sepulchre itself, which is the 
largest of all the cryptcs or caves near Jerusalem, and 
no era can be with any certainty fixed upon as the 
date of its construction. " It ranks," he remarks, 
" among those colossal works which were accomplished 
by the inhabitants of Asia Minor, of Phenicia, and of 
Palestine, in the first ages ; works which differ from 
those of Greece, in displaying less of beauty, but more 
of arduous enterprise ; works which remind us of the 
people, rather than of the artist ; which we refer to 
as monuments of history, rather than of taste." Ap- 
propriate chapels within this same cave, distinguish 
the supposed tombs of Anna, Joachim, and Joseph 
also. In that of the Virgin, the different Christian 
sects have each their altar, and even the Turks have 
an oratory here. 

Proceeding along the valley, at the foot of Mount 
Olivet is the garden of Gethsemane ; an even plat of 
ground, says Maundrell, not above 57 yards square, 
where are shewn some old olive trees, supposed to 
identify the spot to which our Lord was wont to 
resort. (John xviii. 1, 2.) To the south of this spot, 
in the rocks on the eastern side, are what are called 
the sepulchres of the Patriarchs : these are four in 
number, and are severally distinguished as the se- 

mius relates the history of this marvellous funeral. St. Thomas 
having caused the coffin to be opened, nothing was found in it 
but a virgin robe, the simple and mean garment of that queen of 
glory, whom the angels had conveyed to heaven." ! ! ! The identity 
of the sepulchre may be judged of by the legend. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



157 



pulchre of Jehoshaphat, of Absalom, of St. James, and . 
of Zachariah. In those of Absalom and Zachariah, 
the rock has been cut away so as to form an area, in 
the centre of which appears a monument of prodigious 
size, seeming to consist of a single stone, although 
standing as if erected by an architect, and adorned 
with columns appearing to support the edifice, of 
which they are in fact integral parts ; the whole 
of each mausoleum being of one mass of stone, hewn, 
and not built. The ornaments of Absalom's sepulchre 
consist of twenty -four semi -columns of the Doric order, 
not fluted ; six on each front of the monument, which 
stands about fifteen feet from the rock out of which it 
has been hewn. u On the capital is the frieze, with 
the triglyph ; and above the frieze rises a socle, which 
supports a triangular pyramid, too lofty for the total 
height of the tomb. The pyramid is not of the same 
piece as the rest of the monument." * There is a 
room cut out of the rock in Absalom's pillar, con- 
siderably above the level of the ground on the outside. 
In the sides of this room are niches, apparently 
designed to receive corpses or coffins.-)- It is an 
extraordinary circumstance, that to these two sepul- 
chres there is at present no perceptible entrance ; the 
only way of gaining admittance into the interior 
of that of Absalom, is through a hole recently broken 
for the purpose ; to that of Zachariah there is none. 
Pococke conjectures, that if the former served as a 
sepulchre, there might originally have been some 
under -ground entrance, now closed up — " as I was 
informed," he adds, " there is to the tomb of Za- 
chariah, which, they say, is known to the Jews, and 
that they privately carry their dead to it." This latter 
sepulchre is described by Chateaubriand as terminating 
* Chateaubriand, vol. iu p. 100. f Pococke, book i. chap. 6'. 



158 



PALESTINE; OR, 



in a point bending a little back, like the Phrygian 
caps, or a Chinese monument. The sepulchre of 
Jehoshaphat is a grot, the door of which, in a very 
good style, is its principal ornament. Over this are 
sepulchres of the Jews. The cave of St. James has a 
handsome portico of four columns, which do not rest 
upon the ground, but are placed at a certain height in 
the rock, in the same manner as the colonnade of the 
Louvre rises from the first story of the palace. 

It has never been determined when or by what 
people these sepulchres were hewn. They are de- 
scribed by Dr. Clarke as a continuation of one vast 
cemetery, extending along the base of the mountainous 
elevations which surround Jerusalem on its southern 
and eastern sides ; and which, independently of every 
other consideration, would indicate the former ex- 
istence of a numerous, nourishing, and powerful 
people. To relate the legends of the monks respecting 
them, would, he remarks, be worse than silence. Even 
Chateaubriand admits that their architecture contradicts 
the tradition, and proves that they cannot date so far 
back as the earliest period of Jewish antiquity. " If I 
were required," he says, " to fix precisely the age in 
which these mausoleums were erected, I should place 
it about the time of the alliance between the Jews and 
the Lacedemonians, under the first Maccabees. The 
Doric order was still prevalent in Greece ; the Co- 
rinthian did not supplant it till half a century later, 
when the Romans began to overrun Peloponnesus 
and Asia. In naturalising at Jerusalem the architec- 
ture of Corinth and Athens," he adds, " the Jews 
intermixed it with the forms of their peculiar style. 
The tombs in the valley of Jehoshaphat, and the 
sepulchres of the kings (north of the city), display 
a manifest alliance of the Egyptian and Grecian taste : 



THE HOLY LAND. 



159 



from this alliance resulted a heterogeneous kind of 
monuments, forming, as it were, the link between the 
Pyramids and the Parthenon."* Dr. Clarke, who 
cites these observations with high approbation of their 
judiciousness and accuracy, remarks that the columns 
are of that ancient style and character which yet appear 
among the works left by Ionian and Dorian colonies in 
the remains of their Asiatic cities, particularly at 
Telmessus. 

Crossing the brook Kedron, the traveller next ar- 
rives at a fountain on the right, thought by some (says 
Pococke) to be the Dragon-well, mentioned by Nehe- 
miah (c. ii. 13.), but commonly called the fountain of 
the Blessed Virgin, where, the monks say, she washed 
our Saviour's linen ! There is a descent down to it of 
many steps, and a channel is cut from it under the 
rock, which might convey the water to the city. " It 
may be considered," he adds, " whether this was not 
really the ancient fountain of Siloah, which was so far 
under the hill, that it could not be commanded in 
time of war by such as were not masters of that part 
of the city. This fountain seems to have flowed into 
a basin called the pool of Siloam, and probably is the 
same as the lower pool." At this point the valley 
extending towards the west, is much wider than in the 
other parts. 

Adhering to Pococke as our guide, a little beyond 
this fountain, the shallow vale between Mount Sion 
and Moriah begins, called the Valley of Millo ; which 
is much higher than that through which the Kedron 
runs. There is a gentle ascent by it up to the city 
walls; and going into this ravine about a hundred 
paces, you come to the pool of Siloam. " The entrance 
of it is towards the city; and there is a descent by 
* Chateaubriand, vol. ii. pp. 101, 102. 



160 



PALESTINE; OR, 



several steps to a pool about twenty feet wide, fifty- 
five feet long, and ten feet deep from the stairs, having 
a bench on each side of it, and eight pillars. The water 
runs into it from a channel cut under the rock, and 
they say comes from the Temple and other parts 
where they wash, and therefore is not fit to be drunk. 
Possibly this might be the pool of Bethesda, which may 
be the same as that which Nehemiah says was the 
pool that was made, and Josephus calls the pool of 
Solomon." Maundrell, referring apparently to the 
same spot, says : " When we were there, a tanner 
made no scruple to dress his hides in it." 

It seems difficult to recognise in this description, 

Siloa's brook that flowed 
Fast by the oracle of God. 

Chateaubriand speaks of the fountain and pool of 
Siloam as at the foot of Mount Zion, and says : " The 
spring issues from a rock, and runs in a silent stream, 
according to the testimony of Jeremiah, which is con- 
tradicted by a passage in St. Jerome." The French 
author does not say which testimony he considers the 
most to be relied on. He adds : " It has a kind of 
ebb and flood, sometimes discharging its current like 
the fountain of Vaucluse, at others retaining and 
scarcely suffering it to run at all. The water of the 
spring is brackish, and has a very disagreeable taste." 
Dr. Richardson's description is more distinct, but still 
less consistent with Pococke's. After noticing " the 
well of Nehemiah,"* which is described as an ordi- 
nary-sized deep well, provided with tolerably good 
water, at the south-east corner of Mount Zion, at 
the entrance of the valley of Santa Saba (or Jehosha- 

* Pococke found it, by a plummet, to be 122 feet deep, and 
the water was 88 feet high; they told him that sometimes it 
overflowed. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



161 



phat). — he represents the pool of Siloam as occur, 
ring higher up the valley, towards the north, a little 
beyond the village of Siloa, and nearly opposite the 
tombs of Jehoshaphat and Zachariah. " This pool," 
he says, " receives a strong current of water by a 
subterraneous passage cut in the north side of Mount 
Zion, and which seems as if it came by a conduit cut 
through the rock from the pool of Hezekiah, on the 
west side of the city. This pool is also called the 
fountain of the stairs, A flight of sixteen steps leads 
down to a platform, and another flight of thirteen 
steps leads down to the water, which is fresh and good. 
The passage by which the water comes out, has 
obviously been formed by art, and is so large that a 
person, by stooping a little, may walk along it under 
the mountain. The water is about three feet deep, 
and seems to be stagnant in the pool ; but there is a 
considerable stream constantly flowing from it, by 
a passage which is also cut in the rock for a good 
way down, and goes to water the gardens on the 
lower slopes of Mount Zion. There are the remains 
of a Christian church that once adorned the entrance 
to this pool, which, like the fountain of Castalia or 
the spring of Arethusa, seems in days of yore to have 
been treated with signal respect." The spring, how- 
ever, rises within the city, at no great distance from 
the Latin convent.* 

On comparing these varying accounts with Dr. 
Richardson's ichnographical plan of. Jerusalem, it 
should seem that what Pococke has taken for the 
Virgin's well, yet conjectures to be the ancient foun- 
tain of Siloa, is the same as Dr. Richardson and 
Chateaubriand correctly describe under the latter 

* Travels, vol. ii. pp. 357, 35H, 



162 



PALESTINE; OR, 



appellation ; while Pococke's pool of Siloam, which 
he is disposed to identify with the ancient pool of 
Bethesda, is the same as Dr. R. calls, in his plan, the 
King's pool, though he has not described it in the 
text. Concerning the Virgin's claim to either foun- 
tain he is silent. Maundrell agrees with Richardson 
as to the situation of the supposed well of Nehemiah ; 
M so called because reputed to be the same place from 
which that restorer of Israel recovered the fire of 
the altar, after the Babylonish captivity, (2 Mace, 
i. 19)." He places it at the entrance of the valley of 
Jehoshaphat, near the (white mulberry) tree supposed 
to mark the place where Isaiah was sawn asunder 
by order of Manasseh, — another senseless legend. 
The pool of Siloam (Dr. Richardson's King's pool), 
he places a hundred paces higher (northward), on the 
same side ; and the fountain of the Blessed Virgin 
(the real pool of Siloam), about a furlong further. 
Pococke has probably been misled by this in general 
accurate traveller.* Over against this latter fountain, 
on the other side of the valley, is the small and com- 
fortless village now called Siloa ; consisting, according 
to Richardson, of small huts, partly built and partly 
dug in the rock ; but, according to Pococke, who was 
shewn every thing in this part by the sheikh of Siloa, 
of a great number of grottoes, some of which have 
porticoes, and are adorned with the plain Egyptian 

* Chateaubriand places the fountain of Siloa at the foot of 
Mount Zion. He says : " The pool, or rather the two pools 
of the same name, are quite close to the spring: they are still 
used for washing linen as formerly." At the foot of the village 
Siloa, he places " the fountain Rogel," and opposite to this, 
" a third which receives its name from the Blessed Virgin." 
This fountain, he says, mingles its stream with the fountain 
of Siloah. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



163 



cornice: " they call it a village," he says, u because 
these grots are now inhabited by Arabs, but they 
seem to be ancient sepulchres." 

Southward of this village, and nearly facing the 
valley or ravine which runs to the south of Mount 
Zion, there rises from the bed of the Siloa, a moun- 
tain which appears to have been neither named nor 
examined by any of our travellers. Proceeding along 
the ravine, the traveller has on his left hand the 
elevation which the old travellers denominate the 
Hill of Evil Counsel, and which Dr. Clarke, with more 
ingenuity than accuracy, attempts to identify with the 
Zion of Scripture. It is described by Dr. Richardson 
as a low rocky flat, the termination of the high ground 
which lies to the south-west of Jerusalem, and con- 
sequently not a separate hill, as Zion was : it is, 
moreover, of inferior elevation to Mount Zion, which 
would of itself negative Dr. Clarke's hypothesis, and 
could with ease have been approached from the west. 
It never would have been chosen, therefore, as the 
site of a citadel. Whereas Mount Zion has a ravine 
on three of its sides, while the Tyropaeon running 
in a transverse direction, separated it from the hill 
sustaining the lower city. 

On this high ground, Sandys noticed the relics of 
no mean buildings. Dr. Richardson says, it contains 
the remains of a ruined village, which is generally 
called the Casa di Mai Consiglio, or Hill of Evil 
Counsel ; because here, it is said, the Pharisees took 
counsel against Jesus to put him to death. No traveller 
appears to have explored it. About half-way down 
the ravine, which has been generally mistaken for 
the valley of Hinnom, on the side of the mountain, 
is what is called Aceldama, Campo Santo, and the 
Potter's Field. " In the midst hereof," says Sandys, 



164 PALESTINE; OR, 

u a large square room was made by the mother of 
Constantine, the south side walled with the natural 
rock, flat at the top, and equal with the upper level, 
out of which arise certain little cupolas, open in the 
midst to let down the dead bodies. Through these 
we might see the bottom all covered with bones, and 
certain corses but newly let down, it being now the 
sepulchre of the Armenians. A greedy grave, and 
great enough to devour the dead of a whole nation. 
For they say, and I believe it, that the earth thereof, 
within the space of eight and forty hours, will con- 
sume the flesh that is laid thereon." Pococke men- 
tions the same supposed sarcophagous virtue in the 
earth. He describes it as an oblong cavern, about 
twenty-six paces long, by twenty broad, and seemingly 
about twenty deep. The dead are stripped and thrown 
in naked in heaps, as at Naples, Palermo, and other 
places. Through the orifices, both Maundrell and 
Dr. Richardson say, the bodies are to be seen in 
all the stages of decomposition. " From which," 
shrewdly remarks the former, " it may be conjectured 
that this grave does not make that quick despatch 
with the corpses committed to it, which is commonly 
reported." 

Beyond this, the sepulchres begin, which extend 
along the side of the ravine to the south-west and 
west of Mount Zion, and which, like those in the 
valley of Jehoshaphat, are grottoes or excavations in 
the rock. Of these, Dr. Clarke has given the fullest 
description. He recognised them as similar to those 
which he had seen in the ruins of Telmessus in the 
gulf of Glaucus, and as answering to Shaw's account 
of the cryptcB of Laodicea, Jebilee, and Tortosa. They 
are described as a series of subterranean chambers, 
4i hewn with marvellous art, each containing one or 



THE HOLY LAND. 



165 



many repositories for the dead, like cisterns carved 
in the rock, upon the sides of these chambers." 
The doors are so low, that, to look into any one of 
them, it is necessary to stoop, and, in some instances, 
to creep on hands and knees. These doorways are 
grooved for the reception of immense stones, squared 
and fitted to the grooves, which once closed the 
entrance. " Of such a nature, indisputably," adds 
the learned traveller, " were the tombs of the sons 
of Heth, of the kings of Israel, of Lazarus, and of 
Christ." Upon all these sepulchres there are inscrip- 
tions in Hebrew and in Greek. The Hebrew, which 
are by the side of the doors, are so effaced, that it 
is difficult to make any tolerable copy ; they appear 
to have been designedly obliterated by being covered 
with some chalky substance.* The Greek inscriptions 
are more legible : they consist of large letters deeply 
carved on the face of the rock, but only contain the 
words, " Of the holy Zion." Dr. Richardson con- 
siders them to be of modern date and apocryphal 
authority ; but agrees with Dr. Clarke that these are, 
in all probability, the sepulchres of the city of David, 
referred to Nehem. iii. 16. It is remarkable, that 
there are no tombs in the side of the ravine on which 
the city stands : these were clearly out of the city, 
and here it would have been more rational to fix 
upon a site for the holy sepulchre. But u neither the 
Apostles nor the early Christians appear to have had 
any regard whatever for the sepulchre of our Lord. 
It is not once mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, 
or in any of the Epistles. The Apostle Paul, in all 

* One which Dr. Clarke copied, exhibited a mixture of Hebrew 
and the arrow-headed character, and is supposed to be Arabic, as 
the mode of writing corresponds to that used by Arabian Jews in 
their inscriptions on the hills near Jerusalem. 



166 



PALESTINE; OR, 



his visits to the Holy City, in all his meetings with 
the Christians, never once names Calvary, or the 
sepulchre of Christ. The minds of these holy men 
seem to have been solely intent on the spread of the 
Gospel. In all their forcible appeals to the hearts and 
understandings of their hearers, the birth, death, 
and resurrection of Christ, are constantly mentioned, 
but the places where these glorious events occurred, 
are never referred to. Having satisfied themselves 
that the body of the Messiah did not remain in the 
tomb after the third day, they ceased to frequent it, 
or to seek the living among the dead." * 

The only other object of interest in the ravine on 
the west of the city, besides these sepulchres, is the 
large square cistern, mentioned by Dr. Richardson as 
a little to the south of the Jaffa gate ; evidently 
of Jewish workmanship. Pococke describes it as a 
basin about 250 paces long and 100 broad. " The 
bottom is very narrow, and the rock on each side 
appears like steps. This basin is made by building 
a wall across the valley. It is commonly called the 
pool of Bathsheba,-f- but seems to be the lower pool 
of Gihon. It is generally dry, but probably was 
designed to receive not only the rain waters, but also 
the superfluous waters from the upper pool of Gihon. 
(See 2 Chron. xxxii. 30.) At the north end of it is 
a causeway, which leads to the road to Bethlehem. 
There is a channel on it from Solomon's aqueduct, 
which supplies a cistern on each side of the causeway, 
and one at the end of it, where there is plenty of 
water. Above this, the valley is not so deep, but 
capable of receiving a great quantity of water. About 

* Richardson's Travels, vol. ii. p. 338. 

t There is another 1 pool of Bathsheba ' within the city, hear 
the Jaffa gate. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



167 



100 paces to the north, the aqueduct from Solomon's 
pool crosses the vale, the water running part of the 
way on nine arches, from four to six feet high : it 
is then conveyed round the hill on the west side of 
Mount Zion, and so round to the city and temple by 
a covered channel under ground. Nearly a mile to 
the N.N.W. is the pool of Gihon, which I suppose to 
be the upper pool. It is a very large basin, and, if 
I mistake not, is cut down about ten feet into the 
rock, there being a way down to it by steps. It was 
almost dry at that time, and seems designed to receive 
the rain waters which come from the hills about it. 
There is a canal from the pool to the city, which is 
uncovered part of the way, and, it is said, goes to the 
pool in the streets near the holy sepulchre ; and when 
there is a great plenty of water, it runs to the pool 
already mentioned, to the west of the city. For the 
design of these pools seems to have been to receive 
the rain water for the common uses of the city, and 
even to drink in case of necessity. The fountain of 
Gihon probably arose either in the upper pool, or out 
of the high ground above it."* 

The situation of Jerusalem, then, appears to have 
been by no means disadvantageous in respect to the 
supply of water. There were probably wells, besides 
that of Nehemiah, both within and without the city, 
which are now filled up or dry ; and, besides these, 
the pools and aqueducts, together with the little 
stream of Kedron, must have been amply sufficient, 
not only to supply the wants of the population, but 
to serve the purpose of irrigation, on which, in this 
climate, the fertility of the soil depends. It is very 
probable, that the subterraneous passage which has 



* Travels, book i. chap. 6. 



*68 PALESTINE; OH, 

its outlet in the pool of Siloam, and which Dr. 
Richardson describes as a conduit cut in the rock 
from the pool of Hezekiah above described, on the 
west side of the city, was formerly partly open, 
running in the line of the Tyropaeon, or valley of 
Cheesemongers, described by Josephus as separating 
the upper from the lower city, and terminating at 
the pool of Siloam. 

MOUNT OLIVET. 

Having now completed the circuit of the city, we 
have yet to ascend Mount Olivet ; that consecrated 
hill from which the Redeemer of the world looked 
' down on the guilty city, — on the scene of his passion 
and crucifixion, — and predicted the destruction of 
Jerusalem; that hill, from the summit of which he 
afterwards ascended, in the sight of his disciples, 
" far above all heavens." 

The Mount of Olives forms part of a ridge of lime- 
stone hills, extending to the north and the south-west. 
Pococke describes it has having four summits. On the 
lowest and most northerly of these, which, he tells us, 
is called Sulman Tashy, the stone of Solomon, there is 
a large domed sepulchre, and several other Moham- 
medan tombs. The ascent to this point, which is 
to the north-east of the city, he describes as very 
gradual, through pleasant corn-fields planted with 
olive-trees. The second summit is that which over- 
looks the city : the path to it rises from the ruined 
gardens of Gethsemane, which occupy part of the 
valley. About half way up the ascent is a ruined 
monastery, built, as the monks tell us, on the spot 
where our Saviour wept over Jerusalem. From this 
point, the spectator enjoys, perhaps, the best view of 



THE HOLY LAND. 



169 



the Holy City. On reaching the summit, an ex- 
tensive view is obtained towards the east, embracing 
the fertile plain of Jericho, watered by the Jordan, 
and the Dead Sea, enclosed by mountains of con- 
siderable grandeur. Here there is a small village, 
surrounded by some tolerable corn-land.* This sum- 
mit is not relatively high, and would more properly be 
termed a hill, than a mountain : it is not above two 
miles distant from Jerusalem. At a short distance 
from the summit is shewn the supposed print of our 
Saviour's left foot — Chateaubriand says the mark 
of the right was once visible, and Bernard de Breiden- 
bach saw it in 1483 — this is the spot fixed upon by 
the mother of Constantine, as that from which our 
Lord ascended, and over which she accordingly erected 
a church and monastery, the ruins Of which still re- 
main. Pococke describes the building which was 
standing in his time, as a small Gothic chapel, round 
within, and octagon without, and tells us that it was 
converted into a mosque. The Turks, for a stipu- 
lated sum, permit the Christian pilgrims to take an 
impression of the foot-print in wax or plaster, to 
carry home. " Twice," says Dr. Richardson, " I 
visited this memorable spot, and each time it was 
crowded with devout pilgrims, taking casts of the 
holy vestige. They had to purchase permission of the 
Turks ; but, had it not been in the possession of the 
Turks, they would have had to purchase it from the 
more mercenary and not less merciless Romans or 
Greeks." On Ascension eve, the Christians come and 

* This seems to be the village which Pococke supposes to be 
the site of Bethphage : he describes it as about half a mile from 
* the summit of the Ascension,' before you come to Bethany by 
that road. 



PART I. 



170 PALESTINE; OR, 

encamp in the court, and that night they " perform 
the offices of the Ascension." Here, however, as with 
regard to Calvary and almost all the supposed sacred 
places, superstition has blindly followed the blind. 
That this is not the place of the Ascension, is certain 
from the words of St. Luke, who says that our Lord 
led out his disciples " as far as Bethany, and lifted up 
his hands, and blessed them. And it came to pass, 
while he blessed them, he was parted from them, and 
carried up to heaven." Acts i. 

Bethany is a small village to the east of the Mount 
of Olives, on the road to Jericho, not further from 
Jerusalem than the pinnacle of the hill. There are 
two roads to it ; one passes over the Mount of Olives ; 
the other, which is the shorter and easier, winds 
round the eastern end, having the greater part of the 
hill on the north or left hand, and on the right the 
elevation called by some writers the Mount of Offence, 
which is, howwer, very little above the level of the 
valley of Jehoshaphat. The village of Bethany is 
small and poor, and the cultivation of the soil is much 
neglected ; but it is a pleasant and somewhat romantic 
spot, sheltered by Mount Olivet on the north, and 
abounding with trees and long grass. The inhabit- 
ants are Arabs. Here they shew the ruins of a 
sort of castle as the house of Lazarus, and a grotto 
as his tomb, which, of course, is much frequented 
by pilgrims. On the eminence above is a small 
Turkish mosque. The house of Simon the leper, of 
Mary Magdalene, and of Martha, who, it seems, did 
not reside with her brother, and the identical fig-tree 
which our Lord cursed, are among the monkish 
curiosities of the place. 

The third summit of the hill is further towards 
the south. Here Pococke noticed two heaps of ruins, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



171 



©ne of which, the Arabs told him, had been a convent 
of Armenians. The fourth summit, still further 
south, had also an Armenian convent : it was called, 
he says, by the Arabs, Gorek-JVertebet. 

Dr. Clarke has described some subterranean cham- 
bers on the highest summit of Mount Olivet, which 
are not noticed by any preceding traveller. One of 
them, he says, has the shape of a cone of immense 
size, the vertex alone appearing level with the soil, 
and exhibiting a small circular aperture like the 
mouth of a well ; the sides extending below to a great 
depth. These were lined with a hard, red stucco, 
like the substance covering the walls of the subterra- 
nean galleries in the Isle of Aboukir. Dr. Clarke calls 
this place a crypt and a subterranean pyramid, and 
supposes it may have been appropriated to the idola- 
trous worship of Ashtaroth at an early period of the 
Jewish history, and subsequently made a receptacle 
for the bones of men. 

The olive is still found growing in patches at the 
foot of the mount to which it gives its name ; and 
" asa spontaneous produce, uninterruptedly resulting 
from the original growth of this part of the mountain, 
it is impossible," says Dr. Clarke, u to view even 
these trees with indifference." Titus cut down all 
the wood in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem ; but 
there would seem to have been constantly springing 
up a succession of these hardy trees. " It is truly 
a curious and interesting fact," adds the learned 
traveller, " that, during a period of little more than 
two thousand years, Hebrews, Assyrians, Romans, 
Moslems, and Christians, have been successively in 
possession of the rocky mountains of Palestine ; yet, 
the olive still vindicates its paternal soil, and is found, 
at this day, upon the same spot which was called by 



172 



PALESTINE; OR, 



the Hebrew writers Mount Olivet and the Mount 
of Olives, eleven centuries before the Christian era."* 
The valley of Jehoshaphat, which lies between this 
mountain and the hills on which Jerusalem is built, 
is still used as a burial-place by the modern Jews, as 
it was by their ancestors. It is, generally speaking, 
a rocky flat, with a few patches of earth here and 
there, about half a mile in breadth from the Kedron 
to the foot of Mount Olivet, and nearly of the same 
length from Siloa to the garden of Gethsemane. It 
is filled with tombs every where dug in the rock, some 
of them large, indicating the superior condition of 
their ancient possessors, but the greater part are small 
and of the ordinary size. Many of the stones are 
covered with Hebrew inscriptions ; and, to the learned 
in Rabbinical lore, this ancient grave-yard would fur- 
nish an interesting field for investigation. The Jews 
have a tradition, evidently founded on taking literally 
the passage Joel iii. 12, that this narrow valley will 
be the scene of the Final Judgment. The prophet 
Jeremiah evidently refers to the same valley under 
the name of the valley of the Son of Hinnom, or 
the valley of Tophet, the situation being clearly 
marked as being by the entry of the east gate.-f- 

BETHLEHEM. 

From the scene of our Lord's crucifixion and ascen- 
sion, the pilgrim proceeds to visit the place of his 
nativity. There are two roads from Jerusalem to 

* 2 Sam. xv. 30. "Zech. xiv. 4. 

t Jer. xix. 2, 6. Pococke places the valley of Hinnom to the 
south of Jerusalem, but thinks it might include part of that 
to the east. It formed part of the bounds between the tribes 
of Benjamin and Judah, (Jos. xv. 8. xviii. 16.) but the descrip- 
tion is somewhat obscure. 



THE HOLY LAND. 173 

Bethlehem. That which is used at present is the 
shortest ; the old road is more to the west. Passing 
out of the Jaffa gate, the traveller turns to the left, 
and, descending the sloping hank into the ravine, 
leaves on his right the pool of Hezekiah ; he then 
ascends the rocky flat on the other side, and proceeds, 
in a south-west direction, over rocky and barren 
ground, exhibiting, in a few cultivated patches, some 
scanty crops of grain, and, in other parts, a covering 
of grass and wild flowers. The first part of the road 
possesses little interest. The ruined tower of Simeon, 
the Greek monastery of Elias, and the tomb of Rachel, 
are pointed out by the guides : the last is a Turkish 
oratory with a rounded top, like the whitened sepul- 
chre of an Arab sheikh, and the Turks are said to 
have a superstitious regard for the spot as a burial- 
place. Dr. Clarke describes the first view of Bethle- 
hem as imposing. The town appears covering, the 
ridge of a hill on the southern side of a deep and 
extensive valley, and reaching from east to west. The 
most conspicuous object is the monastery erected over 
the supposed " Cave of the Nativity;" its walls and 
battlements have the air of a large fortress. From 
this same point, the Dead Sea is seen below on the 
left, seemingly very near, " but," says Sandys, " not 
so found by the traveller ; for these high, declining 
mountains are not to be directly descended." The 
road winds round the top of a valley which tradition 
has fixed on as the scene of the angelic vision which 
announced the birth of our Lord to the shepherds ; 
but different spots have been selected, the Romish 
authorities not being agreed on this head. 

Bethlehem, the ancient Ephrath, or Ephrata, (called 
in the New Testament Bethlehem Ephrata and Bethle- 
hem of Judea, to distinguish it from Bethlehem of 
l 2 



174 



PALESTINE ; OK, 



Zabuloii,) is situated on a rising ground, about two 
hours' distance, or not quite six miles from Jerusalem. 
Here the traveller meets with a repetition of the same 
puerilities and disgusting mummery which he has 
witnessed at the church of the sepulchre. " The 
stable ," to use the words of Pococke, 4 ' in which our 
Lord was born, is a grotto cut out of the rock, ac- 
cording to the eastern custom.' 1 It is astonishing 
to find so intelligent a writer as Dr. Clarke, gravely 
citing St. Jerome, who wrote in the fifth century, 
as an authority for the truth of the absurd legend 
by which the " Cave of the Nativity" is supposed 
to be identified. The ancient tombs and excavations 
are occasionally used by the Arabs as places of shelter ; 
but the Gospel narrative affords no countenance to the 
notion that the Virgin took refuge in any cave of this 
description. On the contrary, it was evidently a 
manger belonging to the inn or khan : in other words, 
the upper rooms being wholly occupied, the holy 
family were compelled to take up their abode in the 
court allotted to the mules and horses, or other ani- 
mals. To suppose that the inn, or the stable, whether 
attached to the inn or not, was a grotto, is to outrage 
common sense. But the New Testament was not the 
guide which was followed by the mother of Constan- 
tine, to whom the original church owed its foundation. 
The present edifice is represented by Chateaubriand as 
of undoubtedly high antiquity ; yet Doubdan, an old 
traveller, says that the monastery was destroyed in the 
year 1263 by the Moslems ; and in its present state, 
at all events, it cannot lay claim to a higher date. 
The convent is divided among the Greek, Roman, and 
Armenian Christians, to each of whom separate parts 
are assigned as places of worship and habitations for 
the monks ; but, on certain days, all may perform 



THE HOLY LAND. 



175 



their devotions at the altars erected over the conse- 
crated spots. The church is built in the form of a 
cross ; the nave being adorned with forty-eight Co- 
rinthian columns in four rows, each column being two 
feet six inches in diameter, and eighteen feet high, 
including the base and the capital. " As the roof of 
the nave is wanting, the columns support nothing but 
a frieze of wood, which occupies the place of the 
architrave and the whole entablature. Open timber- 
work rests on the walls, and rises into the form of a 
dome to support a roof that no longer exists, or that 
perhaps was never finished." * The remains of some 
paintings on wood and in mosaic, are here and there 
to be seen, exhibiting figures " in full face, upright and 
stiff, but having a majestic effect. " r The nave, which 
is in possession of the Armenians, is separated from 
the three other branches of the cross by a wall, so that 
the unity of the edifice is destroyed. The top of the 
cross is occupied by the choir, which belongs to the 
Greeks. Here is " an altar dedicated to the Wise 
Men of the East," at the foot of which is a marble 
star, corresponding, as the monks say, to the point of 
the heavens where the miraculous meteor became 
stationary, and directly over the spot where the Saviour 
was born in the subterranean church below ! A flight 
of fifteen steps, and a long narrow passage, conduct to 
the sacred crypt or grotto of the Nativity, which is 
thirty-seven feet six inches long, by eleven feet three 
inches in breadth, and nine feet high. It is lined and 
floored with marble, and provided on each side with 
five oratories, w answering precisely to the ten cribs 
or stalls for horses that the stable in which our Saviour 
was born contained." The precise spot of the birth is 
* Chateaubriand's Travels, vol. i. p. 393. 



176 PALESTINE; OR, 

marked by a glory in the floor, composed of marble and 
jasper encircled with silver, around which are inscribed 
the words, Hie de Virgine Maria Jesus Christus natus 
est. Over it is a marble table or altar, which rests 
against the side of the rock, here cut into an arcade. 
The manger is at the distance of seven paces from the 
altar ; it is in a low recess hewn out of the rock, 
to which you descend by two steps, and consists of a 
block of marble, raised about a foot and a half above 
the floor, and hollowed out in the form of a manger. 
Before it is the altar of the Magi. The chapel is 
illuminated by thirty-two lamps, presented by different 
princes of Christendom. Chateaubriand has described 
the scene in his usual florid and imaginative style. 

" Nothing can be more pleasing, or better calcu- 
lated to excite devotional sentiments, than this subter- 
raneous church. It is adorned with pictures of the Ita- 
lian and Spanish schools, which represent the mysteries 
of the place. The usual ornaments of the manger 
are of blue satin, embroidered with silver. Incense 
is continually burning before the cradle of our Saviour. 
I have heard an organ, touched by no ordinary hand, 
play durmg mass, the sweetest and most tender tunes 
of the best Italian composers. These concerts charm 
the Christian Arab, who, leaving his camels to feed, 
repairs, like the shepherds of old, to Bethlehem, to 
adore the King of kings in the manger. I have seen 
this inhabitant of the Desert communicate at the 
altar of the Magi, with a fervour, a piety, a devotion, 
unknown among the Christians of the West. The 
continual arrival of caravans from all the nations of 
Christendom ; the public prayers ; the prostrations ; 
nay, even the richness of the presents sent here by 
the Christian princes, altogether produce feelings, in 



THE HOLY LAND. 



177 



the soul, which it is much easier to conceive than to 
describe." * 

Such are the illusions which the Roman super- 
stition casts over this extraordinary scene. But this 
is not the whole of the pious show. In another sub- 
terraneous chapel, tradition places the sepulchre of 
" the Innocents." From this, the pilgrim is con- 
ducted to the grotto of St. Jerome, where they shew 
the tomb of that father, (although his relics were 
translated to Rome,) that of Eusebius, and those of 
Santa Paula and her son, St. Eustachius.jy This 
pious Roman lady owes the high distinction of having 
her tomb in this consecrated place, to having built and 
endowed several monasteries in the neighbourhood, 
all of which are now in ruins. St. Jerome passed 
great part of his life in this place ; and in the grotto 
shewn as his oratory, is said to have translated that 
version of the Bible which has been adopted by the 
Church of Rome, and is called the Vulgate. He died 
at the advanced age of 91, A.D. 422. 

The village of Bethlehem contains about 300 in- 
habitants, the greater part of whom gain the^r live- 
lihood by making beads, carving mother-of-pearl shells 
with sacred subjects, and manufacturing small tables 
and crucifixes, all which are eagerly purchased by the 
pilgrims. The monks of Bethlehem claim also the 
exclusive privilege of marking the limbs and bodies of 
the devotees with crosses, stars, and monograms, by 
means of gunpowder; a practice borrowed from the 
customs of heathenism, and noticed by Virgil and 
Pomponius Mela. J Pococke says : " It is remarkable 

* Travels in Greece, Palestine, &c. vol. i. p. 396. 
t Chateaubriand says, " St. Paula and St. Eustochium, two 
illustrious Roman ladies." The latter was the son. 
$ /Eneid. lib. iv. ver. 146. Pomp. Mela, lib. xxi. 



178 PALESTINE; OR, 

that the Christians at Jerusalem, Bethlehem, St. John's, 
and Nazareth, are worse than any other Christians. I 
was informed that the women of Bethlehem are very- 
good ; whereas those at J erusalem are worse than the 
men, who are generally better there than at the other 
places. This may be occasioned by the great converse 
which the women have there with those of their own 
sex who go thither as pilgrims ; and I will not venture 
to say, whether too great a familiarity with those 
places in which the sacred mysteries of our Redemp- 
tion were acted, may not be a cause to take off from 
the reverence and awe which they should have for 
them, and lessen the influence they ought to have on 
their conduct." 

At about an hour's distance to the south of Beth- 
lehem, are the pools of Solomon. They are three in 
number, of an oblong figure, and are supported by 
abutments. The antiquity of their appearance entitles 
them, Dr. Richardson thinks, to be considered as the 
work of the Jewish monarch: " like every thing Jew- 
ish," he says, " they are more remarkable for strength 
than for beauty." They are situated at the south 
end of a small valley, and are so disposed on the sloping 
ground, that the waters of the uppermost may descend 
into the second, and those of the second into the third. 
That on the west is nearest the source of the spring, 
and is about 480 feet long ; the second is about 
600 feet in length, and the third about 660 ; the 
breadth of all three being nearly the same, about 
2/0 feet.* They are lined with a thick coat of plaster, 
and are capable of containing a great quantity of 
water, which they discharge into a small aqueduct 
that conveys it to Jerusalem. This aqueduct is built 

* Maundrell says, ninety paces broad; their length 160, 200, 
nd 220 paces. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



179 



on a foundation of stone : the water runs through round 
earthen pipes, about ten inches in diameter, which are 
cased with two stones, hewn out so as to fit them, and 
they are covered over with rough stones, well ce- 
mented together. The whole is so much sunk into 
the ground on the side of the hills round which it is 
carved, that in many places nothing is to be seen of it. 
In time of war, however, this aqueduct could be of no 
service to Jerusalem, as the communication could be 
easily cut off. The fountain which supplies these pools, 
is at about the distance of 140 paces from them. 
u This," says Maundrell, " the friars will have to be that 
sealed fountain to which the holy spouse is compared, 
Cant. iv. 12." And he represents it to have been by no 
means difficult to seal up these springs, as they rise 
under ground, and have no other avenue than a little 
hole, " like to the mouth of a narrow well." — 
**■ Through this hole you descend directly down, but 
not without some difficulty, for about four yards ; 
and then arrive in a vaulted room fifteen paces long 
and eight broad. Joining to this, is another room of 
the same fashion, but somewhat less. Both these 
rooms are covered with handsome stone arches, very 
ancient, and perhaps the work of Solomon himself. 
You find here four places at which the water rises. 
From these separate sources it is conveyed by little 
rivulets into a kind of basin, and from thence is 
carried by a large subterraneous passage down into the 
pools. In the way, before it arrives at the pools, 
there is an aqueduct of brick pipes, which receives 
part of the stream, and carries it by many turnings 
and windings to Jerusalem. Below the pools, here 
runs down a narrow rocky valley enclosed on both 
sides with high mountains. This the friars will have 
to be u the enclosed garden" alluded to in the same 



180 



PALESTINE; OK, 



place of the Canticles. As to the pools, it is probable 
enough they may be the same with Solomon's ; there 
not being the like store of excellent spring- water to 
be met with any where else throughout Palestine. 
But, for the gardens, one may safely affirm, that 
if Solomon made them in the rocky ground which 
is now assigned for them, he demonstrated greater 
power and wealth in finishing his design, than wisdom 
in choosing the place for it." * 

This is supposed to have been the Etam, Etham, or 
Epham of the Scriptures. Josephus says, that there 
were very pleasant gardens, abounding with water, at 
Etham, about fifty furlongs, or a little more than 
six miles from Jerusalem, to which Solomon used to 
resort ; -f- and the Talmudists mention that the waters 
from the fountain of Epham were brought to Jeru- 
salem by Solomon. $ Etam is mentioned in con- 
nexion with Bethlehem and Tekoa, as one of the 
cities built by Rehoboam:|| it was therefore, doubt- 
less, in this neighbourhood. If any stress could be 
laid on the monkish traditions, the ruined village on 
the side of the hill below the aqueduct, still bears the 
name of the village of Solomon. Altogether, it is highly 
reasonable to conclude, that this was the site of one of 
king Solomon's houses of pleasure, where he made 
him " gardens, and orchards, and pools of water."§ 

Tekoa is stated by Pococke to be about six miles to 
the south of Bethlehem. There are considerable 
ruins, he says, on the top of the hill, which is about 
half a mile long, and a furlong broad. At the north- 
east corner are ruins of remains of a large castle, 



* MaundrelL f Joseplius, Antiq. lib. viii. cap. 7« 

t Reland, cited by Pococke. 

II 2 Chron. xi. 6. § Eccl. ii. 5, 6. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



181 



*' winch some call a church ; hut that," he says, 
" seems to have been about the middle of the hill. 
In it there is a deep octagon font of red and white 
marble : I saw also in several parts, pieces of broken 
pillars of the same kind of marble." These remains 
are possibly as ancient as the time of the Crusades, 
as tradition has perpetuated the name of the Frankish 
conquerors in this neighbourhood. The hill affords a 
view of the Dead Sea to the south-east, of Bethlehem 
to the north-west, and of the Mount of Bethulia to 
the west-north-west. Towards the north-west corner 
of the hill, a little below the top, is a grotto or cave, 
in which " there is a fountain that never fails." On 
another elevation, about a mile to the south, are the 
ruins of a large church, " dedicated to St. Panta- 
leone ; " and to the east of Tekoa, on the side of 
another steep hill, Pococke lodged in a ruined castle, 
to which he gives the name of Creightoun. " A little 
beyond this place, the valley runs east and west ; and 
on the right hand is a very large grotto, which the 
Franks call a labyrinth, and the Arabs El Maama^ 
or the hiding-place. The high rocks on the side 
of the valley are almost perpendicular, and the way 
to the grotto is by a terrace formed in the rock, 
which, either by art or nature, is very narrow. The 
rock is supported by great natural pillars ; the top 
rises in several parts like domes. The grotto is per- 
fectly dry ; and there are no petrifactions or stalactites 
in it. We went along a very narrow passage for 
a considerable way, but did not find the end. There 
is a tradition, that the people of the country, to the 
number of 30,000, retired into this grotto to avoid 
a bad air ; which probably might have been the hot 
winds that are sometimes very fatal in these countries. 
This place is so strong, that one would imagine it 

PART II. II 



182 PALESTINE; OR, 

to be one of the strong holds at Engaddi, to which 
David with his men fled from Saul ; and possibly it 
may be that very cave in which he cut off Saul's skirt ; 
for David and his men might with great ease have lain 
hid here, and not have been seen by him. Beyond 
this cave there is a spring of water that drops from 
the rocks." 

The Mountain of the Franks, called also the Mount 
of Bethulia, from a village of that name near it, 
(though no such place is mentioned by ancient authors 
as in this part of Palestine,) is " a single hill, very 
high : the top appears like a large mount formed 
by art. The hill is laid out in terraces, the first 
rising about ten yards above the foot of the hill : 
above this the hill is very steep, and on one side 
there is a gentle ascent made by art. As the hill was 
not so steep to the south, they cut a deep fosse on 
that side, to add a greater strength to it : the foot of 
the hill was encompassed with a wall. There was a 
double circular fortification at top ; the inner wall 
was defended by one round tower, and three semi- 
circular ones at equal distances, the first being towards 
the east. At the foot of the hill, to the north, there 
are great ruins of a church and other buildings. On 
a hanging-ground to the west of them, there is a 
cistern, and the basin of a square pond, which appears 
to have had an island in the middle of it, and pro- 
bably there was some building on it. These improve- 
ments were also encompassed with a double wall ; and 
they say, that there are remains of two aqueducts to it, 
one from the sealed fountain of Solomon, and another 
from the hills south of that fountain." Dr. Pococke, 
from whom this account is taken, conjectures, from 
the relative position of this city, as near Tekoah, that 
it is the ancient Bethhaccerem, mentioned by the 



THE HOLY LAiSTX). 



183 



prophet Jeremiah as the proper place for a beacon. 
(Jer. vi. 1.) The works of the church, however, are 
no doubt referrible to the time of the Frankish king- 
dom of Jerusalem. The tradition which gives name 
to the mountain, is, that the knights of Jerusalem 
held this place forty years after the fall of the sacred 
city. Captain Mangles says : " The place is too small 
ever to have contained even half the number of men 
which would have been requisite to make any stand in 
such a country ; and the ruins, though they may be 
those of a place once defended by Franks, appear to 
have had an earlier origin, as the architecture seems 
to be Roman — We found it hollow on the top, with 
walls round it, and four towers, all much in ruins." 
There can be little doubt that this is, in fact, one of 
the works of Herod ; and its distance seems to agree 
with that of Herodium. That citadel was distant 
from J erusalem about sixty furlongs. It was built on 
" a sort of a moderate hill, raised to a further height 
by the hand of man, till it was of the shape of a wo- 
man's breast. It is encompassed with circular towers, 
and hath a straight ascent up to it." Water was 
brought thither from a great distance, and at a vast 
expense, the place being destitute of water. All 
which exactly answers to the description.* 

All these places may be considered as in the imme- 
diate vicinity of Jerusalem. Another excursion usually 
taken by the traveller, is to 

ST JGHK ? S IN THE DESERT, 

Which is computed to be about six miles to the 
north. north-west of Bethlehem. The road from Beth- 
lehem crosses the Valley of Rephaim. In about half 

* Joseph. Antiq. lib. xiv. cap. 13, § ; lib. xv. cap. 9, § 4. 



184 



PALESTINE; OR, 



an hour, the traveller comes to a village called Boote- 
shallah, a village of Greeks ; which for some time thev 
succeeded in keeping to themselves, by stoutly main- 
taining that no Turk could live in it above two years. 
Maundrell states, that no Turk was willing to stake 
his life in experimenting the truth of it. But, a few 
years before Dr. Pococke visited the place, three or 
four of the inhabitants had become converts to the 
Mahommedan religion, and yet had the courage to 
continue in the village : thus destroying the conve- 
nient spell. Nothing of interest occurs in this route, 
unless it can be thought worth while to mention ano- 
ther " Virgin's Fountain,'' and a village and fountain 
of St. Philip, where, of course, the monks tell us he 
baptized the Ethiopian eunuch. Dr. Richardson took 
a different route to St. John's, as he went directly 
from J erusalem ; and we shall therefore avail ourselves 
of his account, as furnishing a further illustration of 
the immediate vicinity of the sacred city. 

" I went out by the gate of Bethlehem, and turning 
to the right, crossed the line of the ravine, and pro- 
ceeded in a westerly direction. In about ten minutes 
we came to a cistern, with very little water, said to be 
the upper fountain of Gihon. It is dug in the rock, 
in the same manner as the pools of Solomon beyond 
Bethlehem, plastered within, and supported by but- 
tresses, and is not much inferior to the smallest 
of them in dimensions. Here we are informed that 
Zadok the priest, and Nathan the prophet, anointed 
Solomon king over Israel. A small burial-ground lay 
down to the left ; a flock of sheep were feeding 
around ; their shepherd had taken his station on an 
elevated rock, encompassed with ruins, that rises on 
the right, to catch the beams of the morning sun, and 
with his almost tuneless reed was toiling at a native 



THE HOLY LAND. 



185 



air. It hardly required the vicinity of Jerusalem, the 
Mount of Olives, or a recollection of the wisest of men, 
to render this a most interesting scene. We proceeded 
over the hill, and in about twenty minutes arrived at 
the convent of the Holy Cross, which is pleasantly 
situated on the edge of a deep ravine ; and there is a 
hole under the great altar in the church, where the 
tree grew of which the true cross was made. * This 
convent, to the great annoyance of the Romish, is in 
possession of the Greek monks. 

" We next passed the tombs of the illustrious Mac- 
cabees, situated on the summit of a lofty hill on our 
right, and had a distant view of the interesting country 
of Samuel the seer ; and in about an hour after leaving 
the convent in Jerusalem, we arrived at the convent 
of St. John. This monastery is built over the spot 
where John the Baptist, the forerunner of our blessed 
Saviour, was born. How this place came to be ascer- 
tained as the birth-place of John I do not knoAV.-j- 

* «' This convent," says Maundrell, " is very neat in its struc- 
ture, and in its situation delightful. But that which most deserves 
to be noted in it, is the reason of its name and foundation. It is 
because here is the earth, that nourished the root, that bore the 
tree, that yielded the timber, that made the cross. Under the high 
altar you are shewn a hole in the ground where the stump of the 
tree stood : and it meets with not a few visitants so much verier 
stocks than itself, as to fall down and worship it." 

t The present Convent of St. John stands at about three fur- 
longs' distance from the ruined convent shewn as the house of 
Elizabeth. " If," shrewdly remarks Maundrell, " you chance to 
ask, how it came to pass that Elizabeth lived in one house, when 
she was with child, and in another when she brought him forth ? 
the answer you are like to receive is, that the former was her coun- 
try-house, the latter her city habitation ; and that it is no wonder 
for a wife of one of the priests of better rank to be provided with 
such variety." The Convent of St. John had, at the time of his 
yisit (1696), been rebuilt from the ground witbin the preceding four 
years. The church he speaks of as eminently beautiful, consisting 



186 



PALESTINE; OR, 



However, in the church belonging to the convent, we 
read on the left of a splendid altar, the following 
inscription : Hie precursor Domini natus est — Here 
the forerunner of the Lord was born. On the right is 
the altar of Zacharias, and that of the Visitation. The 
church is well proportioned, with a number of hand- 
some columns, some tolerably good mosaic in the floor, 
and a portrait of John the Baptist stuck up against 
the wall ; but it has a poor and deserted appearance, 
as if its votaries were few, and but little concerned 
about preserving its ancient grandeur. The situation, 
however, is exceedingly pleasant ; the monks are 
provided with excellent apartments, and the refectory 
furnished me w r ith a comfortable breakfast of coffee 
and melted butter. 

M The prospect from the top of the convent pre- 
sented to the eye a small cultivated valley, with the 
sides of the rising ground terraced, and planted with 
the olive, the vine, and the fig-tree, and many indi- 
cations that this species of agriculture had been at one 
time much more extensive than at present. The lofty 
Modin falls also within the range of vision ; it is 
crowned with the ruined palace of the Maccabees, and 
the burial-place of the same illustrious family.* 

" Having examined this memorable spot, we pro- 
ceeded through the village, crossed a small stream that 
trickled along the valley, and wound our way over 
a barren track, which industry has cultivated in 
terraces, and which, though called the desert s is really 

of three aisles, with a handsome cupola. Artificers were still em- 
ployed on the convent ; and yet, the friars gave out that not a stone 
had been laid but cost them a dollar. 

* Pococke says that this is a blunder ; that Modin, where the 
Maccabees were born and interred, was in the tribe of Dan. The 
village on the hill is, he says, called Zuba. The tradition he re« 
gards as unfounded. 



THE HOLY LAND. 187 

better cultivated, and more numerously inhabited, than 
any part in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem. Having 
travelled about three-quarters of an hour in a north- 
west direction, we came to a casale, or country village, 
named Colonia, which lay down on our right. Small 
fields of grain occur in different places ; the olive, the 
vine, and fig-trees abound ; and here, at least, the 
desert may be said to bud and blossom like the rose. 
About a quarter of an hour farther, and in the same 
direction, but without any regular track to guide our 
steps, we arrived, in company with a native of Colonia, 
at the cave of St. John. It is situated on the edge of 
a deep rocky ravine, abounding in trees, among which 
are many of those called locust trees.* Close by the 
cave there is a small fountain of fresh water, supplied 
by a stream from the rock, and the ruins of a small 
monastery that had been built over the early residence 
of the messenger of Christ. A small cave, about ten 
feet square, and the scattered fragments of a small 
edifice, are all that remain to testify the splendour 
with which the middle ages decorated this interesting 
spot. The vicinity of a village, and the cultivation 
consequent upon it, have taken away much of the 
desert appearance which it once possessed ; for now, a 
residence in this place would not be any greater ba- 
nishment from the society of man, than in the neigh- 
bourhood of any town or village in Judea. 

" From the cave of St. John we descended the hill 
in an easterly direction ; and, having crossed a culti- 

* " The monuments," justly remarks Maundrell, " of the igno- 
rance of the middle times." The tree alluded to, called by Pococke 
the caroub-tree, by others the carob, or St. John's bread, is the 
ceratonia siliqua, an evergreen of the order pob/gamia dioecia. No- 
thing but the consummate ignorance of the monks could have led 
to the invention of this legend. Locusts are expressly mentioned 
as lawful food, Levit.xi. 21, and are still eaten by the Arabs. 



188 PALESTINE; OR, 

vated valley, of a tolerable size for these parts, we 
arrived in about twenty minutes at the place in the 
Valley of Turpentine, which is recorded as the scene 
of conflict between David and Goliath. Nothing can 
be better described than the ground occupied by the 
two opposing armies is in the language of Scripture : 
6 And Saul and the men of Israel were gathered 
together, and pitched by the Valley of Elah (Turpen- 
tine), and set the battle in array against the Philis- 
tines ; and the Philistines stood on a mountain on 
the one side, and Israel stood on a mountain on the 
other side, and there was a valley between them.' 
This valley is the Valley of Elah ; it is a small valley, 
and the place of their encampment is pointed out 
where it narrows into a broad, deep ravine ; part of it 
was in crop, and part of it under the plough, which 
was drawn by a couple of oxen. A small stream, which 
had shrunk almost under its stony bed, passes through 
it from east to west, from which we are informed 
that David chose out five smooth stones, and hasted 
and ran to meet the haughty champion of Gath. A 
well of water under the bank, with a few olive-trees 
above, on the north side of the valley, are said to mark 
the spot of the shepherd's triumph over his boasting 
antagonist. Saul and his men probably occupied the 
side of the valley which is nearest to Jerusalem ; on 
which the ground is higher and more rugged than 
on the other side, which was occupied by the Philis- 
tines, who, after their defeat, retreated to Ekron ; 
and David brought the head of the Philistine to Jeru- 
salem. From Elah, we returned along a pleasant and 
picturesque road to the convent of St. John, and thence 
retraced our steps to Jerusalem, which we entered a 
little before sun-set." 

The uncertainty, however, in which the topography 



THE HOLY LAND. 



189 



of Palestine has been involved by the misappropriation 
of names of places, affords room to doubt every thing 
that rests on monkish authority. This Vale of Elah, 
which the Scripture narrative describes as lying be- 
tween Shochoh and Azekah, Pococke makes to be much 
further west. To identify the scene, it will only be 
necessary to ascertain the site of those two ancient 
towns : Azekah, we know, was between Beth-horon 
and Bethlehem ; * and if the former be the same as 
the modern Bethoor, the Terebinthine Vale, or Valley 
of Elah, might seem to be correctly placed between 
Bethoor and Bethlehem. 

Besides the route generally taken by the pilgrims, 
by way of Jericho and the Jordan, there is a more 
direct way to the Dead Sea by way of 

SANTA SABA, 

Which was taken by Dr. Pococke, and which crosses 
the track from Jericho to Hebron. 

" We went," says the learned traveller, " to the 
south-east,-]- along the deep and narrow valley in which 
the brook Kedron runs : it has high rocky hills on each 
side, which are shaped into terraces, and doubtless 
produced formerly both corn and wine ; some of them 
are cultivated even at this time. After travelling 
about two miles, we passed by a village on a hill to the 
right called Bethsaon, which is seen also from Beth- 
lehem. This possibly might be the strong castle of 
Bethsura, mentioned in the history of the Maccabees ; J 
though it is extraordinary that a place of such im- 

* See Josh. x. 10, 11. 

t This must be inaccurate; and it is not a little remarkable, that 
this learned and otherwise correct traveller is extremely apt to give 
erroneous bearings, owing to some fault in the manner of his 
taking his observations. $ 2 Mace. xi. 5. 



190 



PALESTINE; OR, 



portance, which was only five furlongs from Jerusalem, 
should be mentioned in no other writings. About six 
miles from Jerusalem we ascended a hill to the south, 
from which we had a prospect of Sion, the Mount of 
Olives, and Bethlehem. We soon came to a ruin 
called Der Benalbede ; which, from the name, seems 
to have been an old convent. We went about an 
hour on the hills, and descending a little to the south, 
came to a lower ground, where we had the first view 
of St. Saba. Then turning east, in less than a mile 
we arrived at that convent, which is situated in a very 
extraordinary manner on the high rocks over the 
brook Kedron. There are a great number of grottoes 
about it, supposed to have been the retreats of hermits. 
The monastic and hermits' life was instituted here in 
the fourth century by St. Saba. They say that there 
have been 10,000 recluses here at one time ; and some 
writers affirm that, in St. Saba's time, there were 
14,000. The monks of this convent never eat flesh ; 
and they have such privileges, that no Mahommedan 
can enter the convent, under the penalty of paying 500 
dollars to the mosque of the Temple of Solomon. 
There are some ruins of a building in the way down 
to the brook Kedron, which probably are remains of 
the novitiate for breeding up young men to the 
monastic life, which is mentioned as belonging to the 
convent. John Damascenus, Euphemius, and Cyril 
the Monk of Jerusalem, lived in this retirement : 
which is computed to be equally distant from Jerusa- 
lem, Bethlehem, and the Dead Sea; that is, about 
three hours from each of them." 

There are two other places in the environs of Jeru- 
salem which remain to be noticed : Emmaus, which is 
within two hours' ride of the city, to the N.W. of 
Modin, and Hebron, which is five hours to the S.W» 



THE HOLY LAND. 



191 



of Bethlehem. The latter was formerly one of the 
places regularly resorted to by the pilgrims ; but so far 
back as when Dr. Pococke was in Palestine, it was no 
longer deemed safe to venture in its neighbourhood ; 
it will, however, occur in the route to the Dead Sea. 
Emmaus, according to Pococke, is now called by the 
Arabs Coubeby, or Djebeby. It lies about three miles 
to the W. of Rama, or Ramathaim-Zophim, the town 
and burial-place of Samuel ; which still is called 
Samuele by the Arabs, and contains a mosque erected 
over the supposed sepulchre of the prophet. To the 
right of the modern village of Emmaus, on a rising 
ground, Dr. Pococke observed great ruins of the old 
town, among which is a church, erected, as the reader 
will anticipate, on the identical site of the house of 
Cleophas. But there are here no objects of interest. 
To the north of Samuele is a very fine valley, probably 
the Valley of Ajalon, from which rise two hills ; that 
to the west has two summits, on the most northern of 
which is a village called Geb, perhaps Gibeon. 

An annual procession of pilgrims takes place after 
the celebration of the Greek Easter, to the river 
Jordan ; and many proceed as far as the Dead Sea, 
performing their ablutions in both. But we shall now 
lay aside the cockle-shell and pilgrim's weeds, and 
take a final leave of the environs of the Holy City ; as 
in the tracts of country which it remains to explore, 
to the west and south of Jerusalem, Quaresmius and 
Doubdan, Sandys and Chateaubriand, and even our 
faithful Maundrell and Pococke, can afford us no aid. 
Our knowledge of a large portion of the ancient king- 
dom of Judea is almost entirely derived from the 
enterprising labours of modern English travellers. 

Let us cast back one look on the most interesting 
spot in the world, _^ where once stood the metropolis 



192 



PALESTINE; OR, 



of Judea. Fuit Hiercsolyma. To conceive of its 
ancient aspect, we must endeavour to shut our eyes to 
the domes, and minarets, and castellated towers which 
now revolt every pleasing and sacred association — 
we must forget the Turks, the Arabs, and the monks, 
and blot out from the picture the holy sepulchre, with 
all the horrible mummery connected with it. We 
must imagine ourselves looking down from Mount 
Olivet on a well-peopled and strongly-fortified city, 
occupying the oblong area of two sloping hills, about 
four miles in circumference, and sheltered on almost 
every side by more commanding elevations, cultivated 
in terraces, and clothed to their very summits with 
the olive, the fig-tree, and the palm. We must bear 
in recollection, that artillery was not invented when 
Jerusalem was approached by the Roman armies ; and 
that its natural position, as surrounded on three sides 
with deep ravines, and on the fourth side with a 
triple wall, rendered it all but impregnable. In point 
of strength, therefore, the site was admirably chosen ; 
while its numerous springs and water-courses, a cir- 
cumstance of the first importance in that country, 
rendered it " beautiful for situation," — imparting fer- 
tility to the rich alluvial soil of the surrounding valleys, 
where the Jews had their gardens, according to the 
custom of the East ; the gardens and burying -places 
which environ the towns, as at Gaza and Jaffa, being 
their greatest ornament. It was in a garden thus 
situated, that Joseph of Arimathea had hewn out a 
sepulchre in the rock which rose from the other side 
of the valley — probably in some part of the Valley 
of Jehoshaphat, through which flowed the river 
Kedron. with its little tributaries, the Siloa and the 
Gihon, " making glad the city of God." * The city 



* Psalm xlvi. 4. Isa. viii. 6. John xviii. 1. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



193 



itself, if it could not boast of a Parthenon, was probably 
equal, in architectural decoration, to any one then 
standing in the world.* It could not, indeed, compare 
with Babylon or Nineveh, or the hundred-gated 
metropolis of Egypt, either in extent or magnificence ; 
but its two temples — the one built by Solomon, and 
the other repaired and completed by Herod — were 
successively the admiration of the world. Of the 
latter, Josephus has left us a description, which, mak- 
ing every allowance for his national partiality, must 
be held to prove that it was every way worthy of the 
founder of Cesarea and Sebaste, and the other cities 
which attest the greatness of the Jewish monarch. 
The stupendous foundations on which the terrace 
rested, at the height of 600 perpendicular feet from 
the valley, which was formed to extend the area of 
the temple, still remain to indicate the gigantic nature 
of the work. From the temple the city had the 
appearance of an amphitheatre, the slope of the hill 
being just sufficient to present it to the greatest 
advantage. At certain distances, towers of not less 
strength than architectural beauty, broke the line of 
the walls ; while on the left, the acropolis of Zion 
overlooked the whole city. Modern Jerusalem, though 
now disfigured by intervals of waste ground and 
ruined heaps, still suggests the idea of 66 a compact 
city ;" -(• but when every part was built upon, it must 
have peculiarly deserved this appellation. Its ancient 
populousness we read of with surprise ; its gates re- 
ceived an influx of strangers from all parts ; and the 
wealth thus poured into it, rendered it probably one 
of the richest cities in the world. If to these topo- 
graphical and political advantages, we add the local 



* Psalm xlviii. 12, 13. 



t Psalm cxxii. 3, 



194 



PALESTINE; OR; 



sanctity which dignified the scene of so many proud 
historical recollections, and connect with the bulwarks, 
and palaces, and gardens of the metropolis of Judea, its 
consecrated character as the peculiar abode of Deity — . 
the chosen mountain of Jehovah — the " city of God;" 
we shall obtain some idea of the aspect which it once 
presented, when the light of Heaven, which no 
where comes with a purer ray, shone on a free and 
favoured people, and the voice of joy and thanks- 
giving was heard ascending from the dwellings of her 
citizens. 

ROUTE FROM JERUSALEM TO HEBRON AND 
THE DEAD SEA. 

Of that part of the ancient kingdom of Judah 
which lay between the country of the Philistines and 
the western coast of the Dead Sea, little or nothing 
was known, till the enterprising spirit of Burckhardt, 
Seetzen, and our distinguished countryman Mr.Bankes, 
led them to forsake the beaten track of pilgrimage, 
and penetrate into regions concealed during more than 
five centuries from European observation. Yet, within 
this district are comprised sites of peculiar interest ; 
among others Hebron, one of the most ancient cities 
in the world,* the burial-place of the patriarch Abra- 
ham,-]- for several years the capital of king David, J 
and the birth-place of John the Baptist. § To this 
interesting spot, situated in the heart of the hill- 
country of Judea, there is a route from Gaza, referred 
to by Sandys, but unexplored by any modern traveller. 
The whole of the intermediate country, including 
some places of ancient note, remains to be examined. 

* Num. xiii. 22. f Gen. xxiii. 2 ; xlix. 31. 

$ 2 Sam. ii. 11. § Luke i. 39, compare with Josh. xxi. \h 



THE HOLY LAND. 



195 



Here we must look for Gath, one of the five Philistine 
satrapies, and the furthest inland, which lay on the 
road from Gaza to Eleutheropolis ; and here we must 
look for that episcopal city, from which Eusebius and 
Jerome estimate the distances and positions of other 
cities.* Through the same tract of country, in a 
longitudinal direction, a Roman road ran from Jeru- 
salem to Aila or JElana, from which the Gulf of Akaba 
received its classical name ; and at this point, geo- 
graphers place the ancient Eziongeber, to which the 
dominion of Solomon extended, as its extreme south- 
eastern boundary. On this line were situated several 
Roman stations ; the names are specified of Elusa, 
Eboda, Lysa, Gypsaria, and Rasa. The southern- 
most city of the Holy Land, however, was Beersheba, 
about twenty miles below Hebron, and more to the 
west : it was given to the tribe of Simeon, whose 
territory lay between that of Judah and the coast. 
A line drawn from the southern border of the Dead 
Sea to " the river of Egypt," -f- (supposed to be the 
stream which falls into the Mediterranean between 
Dair and Gaza,) gives the ancient border of Judah 
and Edom. But, subsequently, the boundaries became 

* Its distance, of twenty miles from Jerusalem, is given by 
Josephus. Antoninus, in his Itinerary, describes it as twenty-four 
miles from Askelon, and eighteen from Lydda, while Eusebius 
places it five miles from Gath, six from Lachish, twenty-five from 
Gerar, twenty from Jattir, and eight from Keilah. Jerome states 
it to have been the metropolis of the Horites — ubi antea habitave- 
runt Horcei, qui interpretantur liberi, unde et ipsa urbs postea sortita 
vocabulum est. 

t Joshua xv. 1 — 4. Some have supposed, that by this expression 
the Nile was intended, but this notion is at variance with the 
precise boundaries laid down by the sacred historian. It was pro- 
bably so named as the boundary of Egypt. Dair is perhaps the 
ancient Adar. 



196 



PALESTINE; OK, 



involved, by invasion and conquest, in considerable 
uncertainty, and the Roman province of Idumea 
trenched on the territory of Judea. Hebron itself 
is spoken of by Joseplius as belonging to Edom. Dis- 
regarding 1 , therefore, the indefinite division of these 
once hostile territories, we shall do best to consider 
the whole of Idumea as an integral part of the Holy 
Land : it was, in fact, included within the dominions 
of Solomon : it formed a province of Herod's king- 
dom, whose father was an Edomite ; and its Christian 
bishops are described in ecclesiastical history as having 
their dioceses in the third Palestine. 

Hebron used to be frequented by Christian pilgrims, 
till, as some travellers tell us, an Englishman un- 
fortunately rode over a child, or some other reason, 
real or pretended, led the monks of Jerusalem to 
dissuade all Europeans from venturing to the south 
of Bethlehem.* Sandys describes it (apparently from 

* The fact appears to be, that the Bethlehemites and the 
Hebronites are at constant variance. Ali Bey met, on the road 
to Bethlehem, a band of Christian shepherds, who were going 
to Jerusalem to lay a complaint against the Mussulman shep- 
herds of El Hhalil, or Hebron, who had carried off a part of their 
cattle. " They had with them two camels, which they had 
taken from the Mussulmans as reprisals. The principal shepherd 
related the affair to one of the most respectable schereefs of 
Jerusalem, who accompanied me ; and he explained himself in 
such energetic terms, that my imagination pictured to itself the 
quarrels of Abraham's shepherds with those of Lot, the war of 
the Five Kings, &c They still preserve the same character, 
manners, and customs ; as also the same costume, which consists 
of a shirt of reddish white wool, bound round the waist by a 
girdle or leathern belt, a black cloth thrown over the shoulders, 
and a piece of white cloth round the head." (Travels, vol. ii. 
p. 231.) Hasselquist states, that the Bethlehemites " are almost 
in constant quarrels with the HierosoJymytes, or with the in- 
habitants of Hebron, or 6ome other of the neighbouring village*. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



197 



report only) as in his time " utterly ruinated." " Hard 
by," he adds, " there is a little village, seated in the 
field of Machpelah, where standeth a goodly temple, 
erected over the cave of their burial (that of the 
patriarchs) by Helena, the mother of Constantine ; 
converted now into a mosque." This does not accu- 
rately correspond to the position of Hebron, which 
is situated on the slope of a hill ; but the church of 
Helena remains. Ali Bey, who visited Hebron in 
1807, passed as a Mussulman, and was consequently 
admitted into the mosque, which is jealously guarded 
by the Turks. He gives the following description of 
the interior. u The sepulchres of Abraham and of his 
family are in a temple that was formerly a Greek 
church. The ascent to it is by a large and fine stair- 
case, that leads to a long gallery, the entrance to 
which is by a small court. Towards the left is a 
portico, resting upon square pillars. * The vestibule 
of the temple contains two rooms; the one to the 
right contains the sepulchre of Abraham, and the 
other, to the left, that of Sarah. In the body of 
the church, which is Gothic, between two large pillars 

and their differences are seldom adjusted without the effusion of 
blood. Five or six year ago (1751), the inhabitants of Bethlehem 
and Hebron carried on such a war as destroyed the greatest part of 
the best inhabitants of both villages ; and the neighbourhood of 
Bethlehem was entirely laid waste." 

* The lower part of the outer wall, Captain Mangles states, is 
evidently antique, being built of great stones, some of them 
upwards of twenty-five feet in length. " It has sixteen pilasters 
on each side, and eight on either end, without capitals, excepting 
a sort of ornamental summit, which extends along the whole 
building, and is a species of cornice : above this is a continua- 
tion of modern masonry." The approach to the entrance is by 
a long flight of steps, which connect the edifice with other ruined 
buildings, 



198 PALESTINE; OR, 

on the right, is seen a small house, in which is the 
sepulchre of Isaac ; and in a similar one, upon the 
left, is that of his wife. The church, which has been 
converted into a mosque, has a meherel, the tribune 
for the preacher on Fridays, and another tribune for 
the mueddens, or singers. On the other side of the 
court is another vestibule, which has also a room on 
each side. In that upon the left is the sepulchre of 
J acob, and in that upon the right, that of his wife. 
At the extremity of the portico of the temple, upon 
the right, is a door which leads to a sort of long gal- 
lery, that still serves as a mosque. From thence I 
passed into another room, in which is the sepulchre 
of Joseph, who died in Egypt, and whose ashes were 
brought hither by the people of Israel. All the 
sepulchres of the patriarchs are covered with rich 
carpets of green silk, magnificently embroidered with 
gold : those of their wives are red, embroidered in 
like manner. The sultans of Constantinople furnish 
these carpets which are renewed from time to time. 
I counted nine, one over the other, upon the sepulchre 
of Abraham. The rooms also which contain the tombs 
are covered with rich carpets. The entrance to them 
is guarded by iron gates, and wooden doors plated 
with silver, with bolts and padlocks of the same metal. 
There are reckoned to be more than a hundred per- 
sons employed in the service of the temple ; it is con- 
sequently easy to imagine how many aims must be 
paid."* 

Is this the cave of the field of Machpelah, which 
was before Mamre ? As truly so, no doubt, as the 
church of the Holy Sepulchre is the tomb of Joseph 
of Arimathea. The Moslems, in this instance also, 



* Travels, vol. ii. pp. 232, 233. 



THE HOLY LAND* 



199 



seem only to have adopted the sacred places which 
they found already designated by the Christians. 
Joseph, we know, was not buried at Hebron, but at 
Sichem ; and the ignorance which has assigned him 
a sepulchre here, affects the credibility of the whole 
legend. But the local features of the place, so far 
as we can gather from the above description, are 
at entire variance with the history. Here would 
seem to be no cave, no grotto, but a Gothic edifice, 
approached by a long flight of steps, consequently on 
an elevation, Hebron itself being on the slope of a hill. 
It is not said that any part of the gallery or of the 
rooms is excavated : the exterior is clearly a building ; 
not, as in other cases, a building over a crypt, but 
enclosing the supposed tombs on its elevated level. 
The whole appears to be only a repetition of the pious 
mummery which we have met with at Jerusalem and 
at Bethlehem. The empress Helena never con- 
descended to consult even probabilities. 

But it may be thought that, although the stable of 
Bethlehem, the spot where the cross was erected, and 
the place where Peter's cock crew, could not be identi- 
fied, the situation of the sepulchre of Abraham must 
have been preserved by tradition ; and the Christians 
could not have imposed a contradictory legend on the 
Jews. Even supposing, however, that it was known 
to the natives in the fourth century, we have no 
reason to believe that they were consulted by the 
priests of Helena ; except, indeed, in one notorious 
instance, when a Jew was put to the torture in order 
to induce him to find the Cross ; and they would have 
been disposed to conceal, rather than to disclose, the 
site of the patriarch's sepulchre. We do not know 
whether the modern Jews acknowledge the mosque 
at Hebron to be the site of Abraham's tomb ; but, if 



200 



PALESTINE; OR, 



they do, their consummate ignorance nullifies their 
authority. It so happens, indeed, that they give the 
name of " the House of Abraham" to the ruins of 
" a small old convent" which stands in the plain be- 
tween Sipheer and Hebron ; and it would be difficult 
to shew why the testimony of tradition should be re- 
lied upon in the one case, and rejected in the other. 
Yet, we have good reason for believing that Abraham 
never lived in a house of any kind. It is just possible, 
however, that there may be some reason for their 
bestowing this name on the building in question ; and, 
were it nearer Hebron, it might seem to promise the 
discovery of the sepulchral cave. 

Mr. Bankes, who, with Captains Irby and Mangles 
and Mr. Legh, passed through Hebron on their way 
to Kerek in May 1818, wei-e the first Englishmen 
who had been there for many centuries. Their route 
from Jerusalem was through Bethlehem and Tekoa, 
and thence through a cultivated plain to a village 
called Sipheer, by the side of a valley. Here they 
noticed nine sepulchral caves, apparently of Roman 
workmanship. On leaving this village they crossed a 
rugged road into another plain, where are the ruins 
of the small convent already mentioned, to which the 
Jews give the name of the House of Abraham. The 
road then ascends the hills, passing between vineyards, 
each having its watch-tower for the remainder of the 
way. The whole distance from Tekoa to Hebron is 
described as a much prettier country than that near 
Jerusalem, the sides of the hills being richly studded 
with the prickly oak, the arbutus, and the Scotch fir, 
with other dwarf trees and flowering-shrubs. 

Hebron, now called El Hhalil, is not a town of 
large dimensions, but the population is considerable. 
According to Ali Bey, it contains about 400 families 



THE HOLY" LAND. 



201 



of Arabs ; but he does not notice either the Jews, who 
are numerous, or the Turks. He describes it as 
situated on the slope of a mountain, and having a 
strong castle. Provisions, he says, are abundant, and 
there is a considerable number of shops. The streets 
are winding, and the houses unusually high. The 
country is well cultivated, to a considerable extent. 
Captain Mangles states that they passed in their route 
many camps of cultivating Arabs. The sheikh of 
Hebron, who has the title of Hakim, is himself a na- 
tive Arab. The town is stated, by the last^mentioned 
writer, to contain a hundred Jewish houses ; and their 
quarters are said to be remarkably clean, the walls 
being neatly whitewashed. They have here a syna- 
gogue, and their priest appears to be in the confidence 
of the motsellim, or Turkish governor. The latter 
personage, on observing the Tartar attendant of Mr. 
Legh, said, with a good-humoured air, that 66 a few 
years ago, if a Tartar had come to Hebron, he would 
have had his head cut off, but that it was not so 
now." There is here a manufactory of glass lamps, 
which are exported to Egypt. A regular party of mer- 
chants and pilgrims set out every year, without any 
escort, so as to fall in with the great Damascus hadj 
near to or at Mecca, which is stated to be at thirty 
days' distance. Hebron is computed to be twenty- 
seven miles S.W. of Jerusalem. 

At about three days' distance from Hebron, to the 
south, the travellers Avere informed of extensive ruins 
at Abdi in the Desert. On leaving Hebron for Kerek, 
their road, turning towards the Dead Sea, leads, in a 
S.E. direction, through a tolerably well cultivated, but 
uninteresting country, presenting numerous ruined 
sites, some with excavated tombs in their immediate 
vicinity ; till, at about three hours' distance, or some- 



202 PALESTINE; OR, 

wliat less, the cultivated land is succeeded by a desert 
country, abandoned to the wandering Arabs. Near 
where this change of aspect begins to present itself, 
is a place called by the natives El Baid, where there 
is a fountain in the rock, and a second pool of green- 
ish water: an ancient site to the N.W. of this spot, 
exhibits a wall of large construction and some good 
masonry. 

The travellers, at some distance from this halting- 
place, fell in with a camp of Jellaheen Arabs, who 
stated that in years of scarcity they retired to Egypt ; 
a custom which would seem to have been handed 
down from the days of the patriarchs, or dictated by 
the same necessity which compelled the sons of Jacob 
to adopt a similar expedient. Among them was an 
Arab tailor, employed in making coats of sheep-skins, 
which he dyed red with ochre, or some such sub- 
stance.* 

At about eight hours'' distance from El Baid, in 
a deep barren valley, very rugged and full of great 
stones, there are the ruins of an old Turkish fort, 
standing on a single rock to the left of the track ; and 
on the right there is a pool of green water, about 
fifteen feet wide, tolerable for horses. Further on, 
the cliff is excavated, at a considerable height, into 
loop-holes, and the pass appears to have been a sort 
of barrier, where duties were probably levied on the 
traveller. The place is called El Zoar. From hence, 
a gravelly ravine, studded with bushes of acacia and 
other shrubs, conducts to the great sandy plain at the 
southern end of the Dead Sea. On entering this 
plain, the traveller has on his right a continued hill, 
composed partly of salt, and partly of hardened sand, 



* Exod. xxv. 5. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



203 



running" S.E. and N.W. ; till, after proceeding a few 
miles, the plain opens to the south, bounded, at the 
distance of about eight miles, by a sandy cliff, from 
sixty to eighty feet high, which traverses the valley 
of El Ghor, like a wall, forming a barrier to the 
waters of the lake when at their greatest height. The 
existence of that long valley, which, under the names 
of El Ghor and El Araba, extends from the Dead Sea 
to the jElanitic gulf, was first ascertained by the 
indefatigable Burckhardt. This prolongation of the 
valley of the Jordan is considered by his learned 
editor as clearly indicating that that river once dis- 
charged itself into the eastern branch of the Red Sea ; 
thus " confirming the truth of that great volcanic 
convulsion described in Gen. xix., which interrupted 
the course of the river, which converted into a lake 
the fertile plain occupied by the cities of Adma, 
Zeboin, Sodom and Gomorrah, and which changed 
all the valley to the southward of that district into 
a sandy desert."* The sandy cliff, described by Cap- 
tains Irby and Mangles, was probably either thrown 
up at the time of that convulsion, or has been sub- 
sequently formed by accumulation, like the sand-hills 
of Egypt. 

Many of our older travellers have described the 
north-western shores of the Dead Sea, to which the 
pilgrims are accustomed to repair from Jerusalem ; but 
we are now, for the first time, put in possession, by 
the publication above referred to, of correct informa- 
tion respecting its southern boundary, and the singu- 
lar phenomena which its shores present. 

* Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, pref. vi. 



204 



PALESTINE; OR, 



THE DEAD SEA. 

This celebrated lake, which the prevailing passion 
for the marvellous long invested with imaginary hor- 
rors, and of which the natives themselves still speak 
with a degree of terror, has received different names 
expressive of its character and origin. In Scripture, 
it is called the sea of the Plain, the Salt Sea, and 
the East Sea.* By Josephus, and the Greek and 
Roman writers, it is spoken of under the appellation 
of Lake Asphaltites, that is, the Bituminous Lake. 
St. Jerome styles it the Dead Sea, because, according 
to the tradition, nothing could live in it. The Arabs 
call it El Amont (the dead), and Bahr Louth, or the 
Sea of Lot ; and the Turks, according to Chateau- 
briand, Ula Deguisi. It is a lake lying between two 
ranges of mountains, which enclose it on the east and 
the west ; on the north it receives the Jordan from 
the plain of Jericho ; while, on the south, it is equally 
open, its margin being the plain already described ; 
and yet it has no outlet for its waters. Reland, 
Pococke, and other travellers, have supposed that it 
must throw off its superfluous waters by some sub- 
terraneous channel ; but, although it has been calcu- 
lated that the Jordan daily discharges into it 6,090,000 
tons of water, besides what it receives from the Arnon 
and several smaller streams, it is now known, that 
the loss by evaporation is adequate to explain the 
absorption of the waters. ■)• Its occasional rise and 

* Deut. iii. 17 ; iv. 49. Num. xxxiv. 3. Josh. xv. 5. Ezek. xlvii. 
18. Joel ii. 20. 

1 *« For, provided the Dead Sea should be, according to the 
general computation, seventy-two miles long and eighteen broad, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



205 



fall at certain seasons, is doubtless owing to the 
greater or less volume which, the Jordan and the 
other streams bring down from the mountains. Po- 
cocke noticed the evident effect of recent inundations 
of the sea, on trees which had been killed by the salt- 
water. At such seasons it spreads itself into what 
Captain Mangles describes as the backwater. The 
high-water mark, at the period of his visit, (the 
beginning of June,) was a mile distant from the 
water's edge. The backwater, however, is never 
quite dry. This periodical rise and fall may possibly 
explain, in some degree, the different accounts which 
have been given of the extent of the lake. Pliny 
makes it 100 miles long, twenty-five miles broad in 
the widest part, and six where it is narrowest. Jose- 
phus states, that it is seventy-two miles and a half 
long, by eighteen miles and three quarters broad; 
with which the account given by Diodorus Siculus 
very nearly agrees. Reckoning the stadium as equal 
to our furlong, his statement would make it above 
seventy-two miles in length and nearly nineteen in 
breadth.* Whereas, the observations taken by Mr. 
Bankes and his companions, from several elevated 
heights, enabled them, they say, to ascertain that the 
utmost extent of the lake, including the backwater, 
does not exceed thirty miles. Yet the ancients were 

then, by allowing, according to Dr. Halley's observation, 6914 
tons of vapour for every square mile, there will be drawn up 
every day above 8,963,000 tons."— Shaw's Travels, folio, p. 
574. 

* Adopting a different estimate of the stadium from Dr. E. D. 
Clarke, Dr. Pococke makes Diodorus say, that it is only sixty- 
two miles and a half long, and seven and a half broad; which he 
thought near the truth. But he judged only by its appearance to 
the eye. 

PART II. N 



206 



PALESTINE ; OB* 



well acqnainted with the sea. Josephus, Julius Afri- 
canus, and Pausanias describe it from their own 
ocular evidence. Are we to conclude that the lake 
has contracted its dimensions, so as to be only half 
its ancient length ? Supposing any change to have 
taken place in the depth of its basin, in the lapse of 
ages, during which the bituminous stores contained 
in the subterranean chambers of the abyss have been 
in a process of decomposition,— this is not impossible. 
For, as the whole of the plain extending from the 
backwater to the sandy wall which traverses the 
Ghor, is a flat, on a level with the sea, it is extremely 
probable that the waters anciently covered that whole 
extent ; and a comparatively slight subsidence of the 
sea would convert the shallow into a marshy, and at 
length arid, plain. This supposition would not, in- 
deed, according to Captain Irby's estimate of the 
distance of the cliff, add more than eight or ten miles 
of length to the lake ; but it would at least lessen 
the discrepancy between the conflicting authorities. 
Even if the whole of the lake should prove to be a 
shallow, the diminution of its waters might be ac- 
counted for by changes in the course of the torrents, 
or in the volume of water which formerly supplied its 
constant waste by evaporation. It is probable, how- 
ever, that, in the low estimation of its length, suffi- 
cient allowance has not been made for its winding or 
curved direction. Pococke says, it did not appear to 
him above a league broad ; and Mr. J olliffe thought the 
expanse could not exceed five or six miles in breadth ; 
but both speak of its northern extremity, where it 
ends in a sort of bay. As it advances southwardly, 
it increases in breadth, assuming the form of a curve, 
or, according to Chateaubriand, the shape of a bow. 
Its course is visible from the northern shore only for 



THE HOLY LAND. 



about ten or fifteen miles, in a S.S.E. direction, dis- 
appearing in a curve towards the East. 

The Jordan, at its embouchure, is deep and rapid, 
rolling a volume of waters from two to three hundred 
feet in width, with a current so violent, that an expert 
swimmer, who attended Mr. Jolliffe, found it im- 
practicable to cross it. Dr. Shaw describes it, indeed, 
as not more than thirty yards broad, and Maundrell, 
as only about twenty yards over ; but they speak of its 
appearance at some distance from the mouth, where 
the pilgrims bathe. The former affirms that it runs 
about two miles an hour, — while the latter speaks of 
its violent and turbid current, " too rapid to be swam 
against." It was the old opinion, that the waters of 
the river passed through the lake without mingling 
with it ; and " I thought I saw," says Pococke, " the 
stream of a different colour. " The fact is, that the 
water of the lake is clear and of the colour of the sea, 
while that of the Jordan is muddy, and of course dis- 
colours the lake with its yellow current. 

The specific gravity of the waters of the Dead Sea 
is supposed to have been much exaggerated by the 
ancient writers, but their statements are now proved 
to be by no means very wide of the truth. Pliny 
says, that no living bodies would sink in it ; and 
Strabo, that persons who went into it were borne up 
to their middle. Josephus states, that Vespasian tried 
the experiment, by ordering some persons who could 
not swim, to be thrown into the water with their 
hands tied behind them, and that they all floated, 
as if impelled upwards by a subterranean current. 
Maundrell says ; " Being willing to make an experi- 
ment of its strength, I went into it, and found it 
bore up my body in swimming with an uncommon 
force. But as for that relation of some authors, that 



208 



jpalestine; or, 



men wading into it were buoyed up to the top as 
soon as they go as deep as the navel, I found it 
by experiment not true." Pococke, however, says : 
" I was much pleased with what I observed of this 
extraordinary water, and stayed in it near a quarter 
of an hour. I found I could lay on it in any posture, 
without motion, and without sinking. It bore me up 
in such a manner, that, when I struck in swimming, 
my legs were above the water, and 1' found it diffi- 
cult to recover my feet. I did not care to venture 
where it was deep, though these effects would pro- 
bably have been more remarkable further in. They 
have a notion that if any one attempted to swim over, 
it would burn up the body ; and they say the same 
of boats, for there are none on the lake." Van Eg- 
mont and Heyman state, that, on swimming to some 
distance from the shore, they found themselves, to 
their great surprise, lifted up by the water. " When 
I had swam to some distance, I endeavoured to sink 
perpendicularly to the bottom, but could not ; for the 
water kept me continually up, and would certainly 
have thrown me upon my face, had I not put forth 
all the strength I was master of, to keep myself in 
a perpendicular posture ; so that I walked in the sea 
as if I had trod on firm ground, without having oc- 
casion to make any of the motions necessary in tread- 
ing fresh water ; and when I was swimming, I was 
obliged to keep my legs the greatest part of the time 
out of the water. My fellow-traveller was agreeably 
surprised to find that he could swim here, having 
never learned. But his case and mine proceeded from 
the gravity of the water, as this certainly does from 
the extraordinary quantity of salt in it." Mr. Jolliffe 
says, he found it very little more buoyant than other 
seas, but he did not go out of his depth. "The 



THE HOLY LAND. 



209 



descent of the beach," he says, " is so gently gradual, 
that I must have waded above a hundred yards to get 
completely out of my depth, and the impatience of the 
Arabians would not allow of time sufficient for this." 
Captain Mangles says : 66 The water is as bitter and 
as buoyant as the people have reported. Those of our 
party who could not swim, floated on its surface like 
corks. On dipping the head in, the eyes smarted 
dreadfully." The question of its specific gravity, in- 
deed, has been set to rest by the chemical analysis of 
the waters made by Dr. Marcet, and published in the 
London Philosophical Transactions for 1807. In 1778, 
Messrs. Lavoisier, Macquer, and Le Sage had con- 
cluded, by experiment, that a hundred pounds of the 
water contain forty-five pounds six ounces of salt ; 
that is, six pounds four ounces of common marine salt, 
and thirty-eight pounds two ounces of marine salt 
with an earthy base. But Dr. Marcet's more accu- 
rate analysis has determined the specific gravity to be 
1,211, (that of fresh water being 1000,) a degree of 
density not to be met with in any other natural 
water ; and it holds in solution the following salts, in 
the stated proportions to 100 grains of the water : 

Muriate of lime 3,920 grains. 

Muriate of magnesia 10,246 

Muriate of soda 10,360 

Sulphate of lime 0,054 

24,580 

So that the water of the lake contains about one- 
fourth of its weight of salts, supposed in a state of 
perfect desiccation ; or if they be desiccated at the 
temperature of 180° on Fahrenheit's scale, they will 
amount to forty-one per cent, of the water. Its other 
general properties are, that, 1. As stated by all travel 

K 2 



210 PALESTINE; OH, 

lers, it is perfectly transparent. 2. Its taste is ex- 
tremely bitter, saline, and pungent. 3. Re-agents 
demonstrate in it the presence of the marine and 
sulphuric acids. 4. It contains no alumine. 5. It is 
not saturated with common salt. 6. It did not change 
the colours of the infusions commonly used to ascer- 
tain the prevalence of an acid or an alkali, such as 
litmus, violet, and turmeric. 

The water of the Jordan, when analysed, exhibited 
results strikingly dissimilar. It is soft, has no saline 
taste, and 500 grains evaporated at 200°, left 0,8 grains 
of dry residue ; that is, only part of the propor- 
tion of solid matter that is contained in the water of 
the lake. Carbonate of lime was detected in the water 
of the river, of which there is no trace in the salt 
water ; and two other precipitates were produced, one 
of them magnesian. It is impossible to account for 
this remarkable difference, on any other principle than 
that which refers the origin of the lake to the convul- 
sion recorded in the Scripture narrative. 

With regard to the agents employed in this cata- 
strophe, there might seem reason to suppose that vol- 
canic phenomena had some share in producing it ; but 
Chateaubriand's remark is deserving of attention. u I 
cannot," he says, " coincide in opinion with those 
who suppose the Dead Sea to be the crater of a vol- 
cano. I have seen Vesuvius, Solfatara, Monte Nuovo 
in the lake of Fusino, the peak of the Azores, the 
Mamalif opposite to Carthage, the extinguished vol- 
canoes of Auvergne ; and remarked in all of them the 
same characters ; that is to say, mountains excavated 
in the form of a tunnel, lava, and ashes, which ex- 
hibited incontestible proofs of the agency of fire." 
After noticing the very different shape and position 
of the Dead Sea, he adds : " Bitumen, warm springs, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



211 



and phosphoric stones are found, it is true, in the 
mountains of Arabia ; but then, the presence of hot 
springs, sulphur, and asphaltos is not sufficient to 
attest the anterior existence of a volcano."* The 
learned Frenchman inclines to adopt the idea of Pro- 
fessors Michaelis and BUsching, that Sodom and Go- 
morrah were built upon a mine of bitumen ; that 
lightning kindled the combustible mass, and that 
the cities sank in the subterraneous conflagration. M. 
Malte Brun ingeniously suggests, that the cities might 
themselves have been built of bituminous stones, and 
thus have been set in flames by the fire of heaven. 
We learn, from the Mosaic account, that the Vale 
of Siddim, which is now occupied by the Dead Sea, 
was full of " slime pits," or pits of bitumen, -f Po- 
cocke says : " It is observed, that the bitumen floats 
on the water, and comes ashore after windy weather; 
the Arabs gather it up, and it serves as pitch for all 
uses, goes into the composition of medicines, £ and is 
thought to have been a very great ingredient in the 
bitumen used in embalming the bodies in Egypt : § 
it has been much used for cerecloths, and has an ill 
smell when burnt. It is probable that there are sub- 
terraneous fires, that throw up this bitumen at the 
bottom of the sea, where it may form itself into a 
mass, which may be broken by the motion of the 
water occasioned by high winds ; and it is very re- 

* Travels in Greece, &c. vol. i. pp. 413, 414. 
t Gen. xiv. 3, 10. 

% Dr. Clarke states, that the monks of St. Salvador (the Latin 
convent of Jerusalem) keep the water of the Dead Sea in jars, 
together with the bitumen of the same lake, among the articles 
of their pharmacy, both being alike esteemed for their medicinal 
properties. (Vol. iv. p. 308.) 

§ This is expressly affirmed by Pliny. 



212 



PALESTINE; OR, 



markable, that the stone called the stone of Moses, 
found about two or three leagues from the sea, which 
burns like a coal, and turns only to a white stone, and 
not to ashes, has the same smell, when burnt, as this 
pitch ; so that it is probable, a stratum of the stone 
under the Dead Sea is one part of the matter that 
feeds the subterraneous fires, and that this bitumen 
boils up out of it." 

To give force to this last conjecture, however, it 
would be requisite to ascertain, whether bitumen is 
capable of being detached from this stone, in a liquid 
state, by the action of fire. The stone in question is 
the black fetid limestone, used at Jerusalem in the 
manufacture of rosaries and amulets, and worn as a 
charm against the plague.* The effluvia which it 
emits on friction, is owing to a strong impregnation 
of sulphuretted hydrogen. If the buildings were con- 
structed of materials of this description, with quarries 
of which the neighbouring mountains abound, they 
would be easily susceptible of ignition by lightning. 
The Scriptural account, however, is explicit, that " the 
Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brim- 
stone and fire from heaven ;"-{- which we may safely 
interpret as implying a shower of inflamed sulphur, 
or nitre. At the same time it is evident, that the 
whole plain underwent a simultaneous convulsion, 
which seems referrible to the consequences of a bi- 
tuminous explosion. In perfect accordance with this 

* Hasselquist describes this mineral as " quartz stones in the 
form of slate — one of the rarest natural curiosities," he says, 
" I got in my travels. If it was burnt, it smelt like bitumen^ 
which proves that it had its origin from it, like all the slate 
of this country."— Voyages and Travels, p. 131. See Dr. Chrke's 
Geological Authorities, vol. iv. p. 307? 

t Gen. xix. 24. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



213 



view of the catastrophe, we find the very materials, 
as it were, of this awful visitation still at hand in the 
neighbouring hills ; from which they might have been 
poured down by the agency of a thunder-storm, with- 
out excluding a supernatural cause from the expla- 
nation of the phenomena. Captains Irby and Man- 
gles collected, on the southern coast, lumps of nitre 
and fine sulphur, from the size of a nutmeg up to that 
of a small hen's egg, which, it was evident from their 
situation, had been brought down by the rain : u their 
great deposite must be sought for," they say, " in 
the cliff." 

Dr. Shaw supposes that the bitumen, as it rises, !s 
accompanied with sulphur, "inasmuch as both of them 
are found promiscuously upon the wash of the shore." 
But his conjecture is not founded on observation. The 
statement he gives, is founded on hearsay evidence ; 
we cannot, therefore, admit him as (in this case) an 
original authority. " I was informed," he says, " that 
the bitumen, for which this lake hath been always re- 
markable, is raised, at certain times, from the bottom, 
in large hemispheres ; which, as soon as they touch 
the surface, and so are acted upon by the external air, 
burst at once with great smoke and noise, like the 
pulvis fulminans of the chemists, and disperse them- 
selves round about in a thousand pieces. But this 
happens only near the shore ; for, in greater depths, 
the eruptions are supposed to discover themselves only 
in such columns of smoke as are now and then ob- 
served to arise from the lake." * Chateaubriand speaks 
of the puffs of smoke " which announce or follow the 
emersion of asphaltos, and of fogs that are really un- 
wholesome like all other fogs." These he considers 



* Travels, folio, p. 374. 



214 PALESTINE; OK, 

as the supposed pestilential vapours said to arise from 
the bosom of the lake. But it admits of question, in 
the deficiency of more specific information, whether 
what has been taken for columns of smoke, may not 
be the effect of evaporation.* From the very interest- 
ing account furnished by Captains Irby and Mangles, 
we obtain some further particulars of this astonishing 
scene, which may seem to justify the conjecture. 

On entering upon the plain to the southward of the 
lake, exclusive of the saline appearance left by the 
retiring of the waters, they noticed lying on the 
ground, several large fragments of rock-salt, which led 
them to examine the hill on the right of the ravine by 
which they had descended. This has been described 
as composed partly of salt, partly of hardened sand : 
the salt in many instances was hanging from the cliffs, 
in clear perpendicular points resembling icicles. They 
observed also strata of salt of considerable thickness, 
having very little sand mixed with it, generally in per- 
pendicular lines. During the rainy season, the tor- 
rents apparently bring down immense masses of this 
mineral. Strabo mentions, that to the southward of 
the Dead Sea there are towns and cities built entirely 
of salt ; and " although," adds the writer, " such an 
account seems strange, yet, when we contemplated the 
scene before us, it did not seem improbable. The 
sea had thrown up at high-water mark a quantity of 
wood, with which the travellers attempted to make a 
fire, in order to bake some bread ; but it was so im- 
pregnated with salt, that all their efforts were un- 

* ' e As soon as we came to the pass, which commands an ex- 
tensive prospect of the Dead Sea, we could observe the effect of 
the evaporation arising from it in broad transparent columns of 
vapour, not unlike water-spouts in appearance, but very much 
larger."— Irby and Mangles, p. 447, 



THE HOLY LAND. 215 

availing. The track, after leaving the salt hill, led 
across the barren flats of the backwater — then left 
partially dry by the effects of evaporation. They 
passed six drains running into the sea : some were 
wet, and still draining the dreary level which they 
intersected ; others were dry. These had a strong 
marshy smell, similar to what is perceivable on most 
of the muddy flats in salt-water harbours, but by 
no means more unpleasant. The water on the main 
body of the lake is perfectly free from any smell. 
Besides these salt-wafrer drains, several little torrents 
descending from the eastern mountains find their way 
into the sea. At about half an hour from the first 
drain, and three hours from the western cliff of the 
Ghor, is the Nahr-el-Hussan, or Horse River ; which, 
traversing the plain in a N.N.W. direction, falls into 
the backwater at its southern edge. Three hours 
further, keeping the line of the coast, the Nahr-el- 
Assel, or Honey River, falls into its eastern border. 
From thence, at four hours' distance, the Nahr-el- 
Derrah (or Darah) crossing the valley on the eastern 
side of the backwater, runs northward into a bay of 
the Dead Sea, formed by an elevated tongue of land, 
extending some miles into the lake : between which 
and its western shore is the strait or outlet into the 
backwater. At the narrowest part of this strait, 
where a low promontory projects from the opposite or 
western shore, is a ford, which the natives state to be 
at no season impassable : here the route crosses which 
is taken by the caravan from Terek. This description 
exactly answers to the concise account cited by Cha- 
teaubriand from the narrative of Daniel, Abbot of St. 
Saba, the only person then known to have made the 
tour of the lake. " The Dead Sea, at its extremity," 
he says, M is separated as it were into two parts ; and 



216 



PALESTINE; OR, 



there is a way by which you may walk across it, being 
only mid-leg deep, — at least in summer. The land at 
that point rises and bounds another small lake, of a 
circular or rather oval figure, surrounded with plains 
and mountains of salt." 

In the plain bordering upon the lake are high 
rushes, which give way to a variety of bushes and wild 
plants ; among others, several species of acacia, the 
dwarf mimosa, the tamarisk, the wild cotton plant, 
the doom, and the oschar. Captain Mangles describes 
also a very curious tree, which abounds here ; its fruit 
resembling the currant in its growth, but with the 
colour of a plum ; having a strong aromatic taste 
resembling mustard, and, if taken in any quantity, 
producing the same irritability in the nose and eyes. 
The leaves have the same pungent flavour in a less 
degree. On the borders of the Derrah, they observed 
another peculiar shrub, its branches inclining down- 
wards, of a dull green, with little or no foliage ; the 
fruit about the size of an almond in its green husk, 
and not very dissimilar in colour, but seamed or 
ribbed. When ripe, it becomes soft and juicy, like a 
green gage, but the skin retains its roughness. It 
contains a stone. The taste has a sort of sweetness, 
mixed with a strong bitter ; the smell is sickly and 
disagreeable. It is said by the natives to be poisonous, 
children being reported to have frequently been dis- 
ordered, and even to have died, after eating it. Near 
the Nahr-el-Hussan there was plenty of corn grow- 
ing in the open grounds between the bushes. Pro- 
ceeding along the foot of the mountains which bound 
the east side of the plains, the track is rugged and 
barren in the extreme, presenting innumerable frag- 
ments of red and grey granite, grey, red, and black 
porphyry, serpentine, a beautiful black basalt, breccia, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



217 



and other kinds of stone from the neighbouring moun- 
tains, scattered in all directions. The Nahr-el-Derrah 
waters a beautiful shady ravine : its banks being 
clothed in profusion with the palm, acacia, aspine, and 
oleander, afford a refreshing contrast to the desert 
appearance of the neighbourhood. The rocks above, 
which are composed chiefly of a dark sand-stone and 
various kinds of marble, present hardly a vestige of 
vegetation. Near where the Derrah opens from its 
glen into the plain to the northward, there is very 
clearly to be perceived an ancient site. Stones that 
have been used in building, though for the most part 
unhewn, with bricks and fragments of pottery, are 
strewed over the uneven surface, for at least half 
a mile quite down to the plain. Captain Mangles 
noticed a column, and a pretty specimen of antique 
variegated glass. The hare and the partridge of the 
desert, or quail, abound in the thickets, and there 
were observed frequent tracks of the wild boar. Se- 
veral villages of Ghorneys, a sort of Mahommedaa 
Pariahs, are scattered about the plains. Near the sea, 
the vegetation consists chiefly of the tamarisk and the 
cane, so high and so thickly set as to render many 
parts wholly impassable. The rotten and marshy 
ground, during the winter season especially, renders 
the passage very difficult. The foliage has a salt dew 
hanging on it, which is greasy to the touch. A nar- 
row, pebbly beach separates the jungle from the sea, 
which encroaches more or less on the shore, according 
to the season. The highest point which it reaches, is 
marked by an extensive deposite of timber of all sizes. 
It dries off into shallows and small pools, which depo- 
site a salt as fine and well bleached, in some instances, 
as that in regular salt-pans. The travellers found seve- 
ral of the natives peeling off a solid layer of salt, seve- 

PART II, O 



218 ^ALESTIIKE; Oil* 

ral inches thick, with which they loaded their asses. In 
some parts the ground is treacherous, heing only glazed 
over with a thin crust, not unlike the sediment of mud 
which is in some parts left by the Nile ; and towards 
the strait, where the water, being more shallow, re- 
tires rapidly, a considerable level is left, encrusted 
with a salt that is but half dried and consolidated, 
appearing like ice in the commencement of a thaw., 
and giving way nearly ancle deep. At the northern- 
most point of the cape, some rotten branches were 
found standing up, so encrusted with salt that they 
had the appearance of fine white coral. 

It was long a received tradition, that no living 
thing could pass over this lake without being suffo- 
cated by the vapours, and that no fish could endure 
the deadly waters. Captains Irby and Mangles found 
on the^shores a great number of dead locusts, which 
might almost seem, they remark, to lend some coun- 
tenance to the tale, were it not a spectacle sufficiently 
common upon other shores, as about El Arisen, and in. 
Sicily. These, however, had not become putrid, nor 
had they any smell, as when cast up by any other sea, 
being completely penetrated and encrusted with salt ; 
and they had lost their colour. Of the fabulous nature 
of one part of the tradition, the travellers had ocular 
demonstration ; first, in a pair of Egyptian geese, and 
afterwards in a flight of pigeons, which passed over 
the sea.* And Maundrell saw several birds, he does 

* Van Egmont and Heyman carried with them two sparrows, 
for the purpose of ascertaining the alleged fact, and having 
plucked out a few feathers from each wing, so that they could not 
fly long, set them at liberty. " After a short flight, they fell into, 
or rather upon the sea ; hut so far were they from dying there, that 
they both got safe ashore ; though, had there been any such noxious 
effluvia, they were long enough on the surface of the water to have 
felt its deleterious effect." 



THE HOLY LAND. 



219 



not say of what species, flying about and over the sea, 
without any visible harm. The latter part also of the 
report, he adds, " I have some reason to suspect as 
false ; having observed among the pebbles on the shore 
two or three shells of fish, resembling oyster -shells. 
These were cast up by the waves, at two hours' dis- 
tance from the mouth of the Jordan ; which I mention, 
lest it should be suspected that they might be brought 
into the sea that way." * Seetzen, too, speaks of 
some snail-shells he found on the coast, as proving 
that there are living creatures in the lake. And 
Captain Irby and his companions found, besides 
snail-shells, a small spiral species. But these were 
invariably without fish, and had not apparently been 
occupied for a long time. Pococke justly remarks, 
that it is not probable that the fresh-water fish 
of the Jordan could live in the salt-water ; *but he 
was told that a monk had seen fish caught in the 
lake — a most indubitable testimony ! M. Chateau- 
briand, moreover, heard at midnight a noise upon 
the lake, which, he was told by the Bethlehemites, 
proceeded from legions of small fish which come 
and leap about on the shore- — doubtless seeking 
to be delivered from the pestilential waters. This 
was, we apprehend, nothing more than a hoax upon 
the learned Frenchman. Hitherto, we are without 
any satisfactory evidence that the lake contains any 
living creatures. Captain Mangles mentions it as 
remarkable, how few living things, whether birds, 
insects, or reptiles, are to be seen on its shores. The 
want of vegetable matter and of fresh water is a very 
sufficient reason. 

* Hasselquist says : " The Arabs say, there are no fish in this 
sea ; however, I doubt the truth of this, as there are shell-fish" 
(on the shore). 



220 PALESTINE; OR, 

M. Seetzen imagined that he had discovered an 
island of some extent in the Dead Sea ; but this our 
English travellers ascertained beyond all doubt to 
have no existence. One evening, however, about 
sunset, they were themselves deceived by a dark sha- 
dow on the waters, which assumed so exactly the 
appearance of an island, that, even after looking at it 
through a telescope, they concluded it to be one. " It 
is not the only time," they say, " that such a pheno- 
menon has presented itself to us : in two instances, 
looking up the sea from its southern extremity, we 
saw it apparently closed by a low dark line, like a bar 
of sand, to the northward ; and on another occasion, 
two small islands seemed to present themselves be- 
tween a long sharp promontory on the western shore." 
They profess themselves at a loss to account for these 
appearances, which they suppose to be what deceived 
M. Seetzen ; but they suggest it as just possible, that 
he might see " one of those temporary islands Of 
bitumen which Pliny describes as being several acres 
in extent." Is it not possible that M. Seetzen's island, 
and the appearances observed by the English travel- 
lers, were shallows ? — This suggests an interesting 
inquiry. 

Chateaubriand says : " Several - travellers, and, 
among others, Troilo and D'Arvieux, assert, that 
they remarked fragments of walls and palaces in the 
Dead Sea. This statement seems to be confirmed by 
Maundrell and Father Nau. The ancients speak 
more positively on this subject. Josephus, employing 
a poetic expression, says, that he perceived on the 
banks of the lake, the shades of the overwhelmed 
cities. Strabo gives a circumference of sixty stadia to 
the ruins of Sodom, which are mentioned also by 
Tacitus. I know not whether they still exist ; but 3 as 



THE HOLY LAND. 



221 



the lake rises and falls at certain seasons, it is possible 
that it may alternately cover and expose the skeletons 
of the reprobate cities."* Mr. Jolliffe mentions the 
same story. " We have even," he says, " heard it 
asserted with confidence, that broken columns and 
other architectural ruins are visible at certain seasons, 
when the water is much retired below its usual level ; 
but of this statement, our informers, when closely 
pressed, could not adduce any satisfactory confirma- 
tion." We are afraid that, notwithstanding the 
authority of Strabo, we must class this legend with the 
dreams of imagination ; or perhaps its origin may be 
referred to some such optical delusion as led to the 
mistake respecting the supposed island. In the travels 
of Egmont and Heyman, however, there is a statement 
which may throw some light on the subject. They 
say: " We also saw here a kind of jetty or prominence, 
which appears to have been a heap of stones from 
time to time thrown up by the sea ; but it is a current 
opinion here, that they are part of the ruins of one of 

* Travels in Greece, &c. vol. i. p. 415. Maundrell's alleged 
confirmation is worth little. Being desirous to see the remains 
(if there were any) of those cities anciently situate in this place, 
and made so dreadful an example of the Divine vengeance, I dili- 
gently surveyed the waters as far as my eye could reach ; but 
neither could I discern any heaps of ruins, nor any smoke ascend- 
ing above the surface of the water, as is usually described in the 
writings and maps of geographers. But yet I must not omit what 
was confidently asserted to me by the father guardian and the pro- 
curator of Jerusalem, both men in years, and seemingly not desti- 
tute either of sense or probity, viz. that they had once actually 
seen one of these ruins ; that it was so near the shore, and the 
water so shallow at that time, that they, together with some 
Frenchmen, went to it, and found there several pillars and other 
fragments of buildings. The cause of our being deprived of this 
sight, was, I suppose, the height of the water." It is not difficult to 
perceive, from this dry remark, that our traveller's incredulity was 
not overcome by his grave authorities. 



222 PALESTINE; OR, 

the towns which are buried under it." The bare pos- 
sibility, that any wreck of the guilty cities should 
be brought to light, is sufficient to excite an intense 
curiosity to explore this mysterious flood, which, so 
far as appears from any records, no bark has ever 
ploughed,* no plummet ever sounded. Should per- 
mission ever be obtained from the Turks, to launch a 
vessel on the lake, its navigation, if practicable, would 
probably lead to some interesting results. 

There yet remains to be noticed, in connexion with 
this subject, the far-famed apples 

** which grew 
Near that bituminous lake where Sodom stood." 

Tacitus and Josephus both mention this fruit as beau- 
tiful to the eye, but crumbling, at the touch, to dust 
and bitter ashes.-f- Reland, Maundrell, and Shaw, all 
express themselves as sceptical concerning its existence. 
But none of them explored the borders of the lake 
sufficiently to entitle them to give a decided opinion on 
the subject, having only seen its northern shore. 
Pococke is inclined to lay more stress on the ancient 
testimonies ; and he supposes the apples to be pome- 
granates, " which having a tough, hard rind, and 
being left on the trees two or three years, the inside 
may be dried to dust, and the outside may remain 
fair." Hasselquist, however, the pupil of Linnaeus, 
pronounces the Poma Sodomitica to be the fruit of the 
Solarium melongena, (egg-plant nightshade, or mad- 
apple,) which he states to be found in great abundance 

* Strabo, Pliny, and Diodorus Siculus speak of rafts, composed 
of interwoven reeds, on which the Arabs used to go to collect 
asphaltos. 

A See also Wisdom x. 7. 



/ 



THE HOLY LAND. 



223 



round Jericho, in the valleys near the Jordan, and in 
the neighbourhood of the Dead Sea. " It is true," he 
says, " that these apples are sometimes full of dust, 
but this appears only when the fruit is attacked by 
an insect (tenthredo), which converts the whole of 
the inside into dust, leaving nothing but the rind 
entire, without causing it to lose any of its colour." 
M. Seetzen, diiFering from Hasselquist in opinion, sup- 
poses the apple of Sodom to be the fruit of a species of 
cotton-tree, which, he was told, grows in the plain of 
El Ghor, in appearance resembling a fig-tree, and 
known by the name of Abeschaez. The cotton is con- 
tained in the fruit, which is like a pomegranate, but 
has no pulp. Chateaubriand follows with his discovery 
of what he concludes to be the long-sought fruit. The 
shrub which bears it, he says, grows two or three 
leagues from the mouth of the Jordan: it is thorny, 
with small taper leaves, and its fruit is exactly like the 
little Egyptian lemon both in size and colour. " Be- 
fore it is ripe, it is filled with a corrosive and saline 
juice : when dried, it yields a blackish seed, which 
may be compared to ashes, and which in taste resembles 
bitter pepper." He gathered half a dozen of these 
fruits, but has no name for them, either popular or 
botanical. Next comes Mr. Jolliffe. He found in a 
thicket of brushwood, about half a mile from the plain 
of Jericho, a shrub five or six feet high, on which 
grew clusters of fruit, about the size of a small apricot, 
of a bright yellow colour, w which, contrasting with 
the delicate verdure of the foliage, seemed like the 
union of gold with emeralds. Possibly, when ripe, 
they may crumble into dust upon any violent pressure." 
Those which this gentleman gathered did not crumble, 
nor even retain the slightest mark of indenture from 
the touch ; they would seem to want, therefore, the 



224 PALESTINE ; OR, 



most essential characteristic of the fruit in question. 
But they were not ripe. This shrub is probably the 
same as that described by Chateaubriand. Lastly, 
Captains Irby and Mangles have no doubt that they 
have discovered it in the oskar plant, which they 
noticed on the shores of the Dead Sea, grown to the 
stature of a tree ; its trunk measuring, in many in- 
stances, two feet or more in circumference, and the 
boughs at least fifteen feet high. The filaments en- 
closed in the fruit, somewhat resemble the down of a 
thistle, and are used by the natives as a stuffing 
for their cushions ; " they likewise twist them, like 
thin rope, into matches for their guns, which, they 
assured us, required no application of sulphur to render 
them combustible." This is probably the same tree 
that M. Seetzen refers to. But still, the correspond- 
ence to the ancient description is by no means perfect ; 
there being little resemblance between cotton or thistle- 
down, and ashes or dust. M. Chateaubriand's golden 
fruit, full of bitter seed, comes the nearest to what is 
told us of the deceitful apple. If it be any thing more 
than a fable, it must have been a production peculiar 
to this part of Palestine, or it would not have excited 
such general attention. On this account, the oskar 
and the solanum seem alike unentitled to the distinc- 
tion ; and for the same reason, the pomegranate must 
altogether be excluded from consideration. The fruit 
of the solanum melongena, which belongs to the same 
genus as the common potatoe, is white, resembling a 
large egg, and is said to impart an agreeable acid 
flavour to soups and sauces, for the sake of which it is 
cultivated in the south of Europe. This could hardly 
be what Tacitus and Josephus referred to. It is pos- 
sible, indeed, that what they describe, may have ori- 
ginated, like the oak-galls in this country, in the work 



THE HOLY LAND. 



225 



of some insect : for these remarkable productions 
sometimes acquire a considerable size and beauty of 
colour. Future travellers will be inexcusable if they 
leave this question undecided. 

The usual route by which travellers have reached 
the northern shores of the Dead Sea, is by Jericho and 
Santa Saba. Before we finally quit the land of Judea, 
we must notice the interesting sites which occur in 
this track. 

THE ROAD TO JERICHO AND THE JORDAN. 

Soon after leaving Bethany, the road descends the 
other side of Mount Olivet, having a valley to the 
right : it then leads for three or four miles along the 
valley, and at length turns northward into a moun- 
tainous desert which the ancients have fixed upon as 
a fit place in which to lay the scene of our Lord's 
temptation. " A most miserable, dry, barren place 
it is," says Maundrell, " consisting of high rocky 
mountains so torn and disordered, as if the earth had 
here suffered some great convulsion, in which its very 
bowels had been turned outward. On the left hand," 
continues this accurate traveller, " looking down into 
a deep valley, as we passed along, we saw some ruins 
of small cells and cottages, which they told us were 
formerly the habitations of hermits retiring hither for 
penance and mortification. And certainly, there could 
not be found in the whole earth a more comfortless and 
abandoned place for that purpose. From the top of 
these hills of desolation we had, however, a delightful 
prospect of the mountains of Arabia, the Dead Sea, 
and the plain of Jericho; into which last place we 
descended, after about five hours' march from Jeru- 
salem. As soon as we entered the plain, we turned up 
o 2 



226 



PALESTINE; OR, 



on the left hand, and going about one hour that way, 
came to the foot of the Quarantania ; which, they say, 
is the mountain into which the devil took our blessed 
Saviour, when he tempted him with that visionary 
scene of all the kingdoms and glories of the world. It 
is, as St. Matthew styles it, an exceeding high moun- 
tain, and in its ascent not only difficult but dangerous. 
It has a small chapel at the top, and another about 
half way up, founded upon a prominent part of the 
rock. Near this latter are several caves and holes in 
the side of the mountain, made use of anciently by 
hermits, and by some at this day, for places to keep 
their Lent in, in imitation of that of our blessed 
Saviour. In most of these grots we found certain 
Arabs quartered with fire-arms, who obstructed our 
ascent, demanding two hundred dollars for leave to go 
up the mountains. So we departed without further 
trouble, not a little glad to have so good an excuse for 
not climbing so dangerous a precipice. * 

* Hasselquist attempted to teach the summit of " the mountain 
where Christ fasted and was tempted, 5 ' but found it too perilous 
an adventure. " The mountain," he says, " is high and pointed; 
and on our left, as we ascended^ was a deep valley, towards which, 
the rock was perpendicularly steep. It consists of a loose white 
limestone, mixed with another that is greyish and harder. The 
way up to the highest point is dangerous beyond imagination. It 
is narrow, steep, and full of rocks and stones, which obliged uss 
frequently to creep over them before we could accomplish our de- 
sign. The difficulty is increased by the valley on one side, which., 
besides its terrible aspect, is dangerous in case one should slip, as in 
such case it would be impossible to escape death. Near the top 
of the mountain are the ruins of an old Greek convent, which, 
shew how the monks and anchorites of the old Christians lived, 
and what places they inhabited. The Greeks preserve the ancient 
dwellings of their forefathers in Mount Sinai, Saba, St. Elias, and 
other places in the East. I went as far up on this terrible moun- 
tain of temptation as prudence would permit ; but ventured not 
to go to the top, whither I sent my servant to bring what natural 



THE HOLY LAND. 227 

" Turning down from hence into the plain, we 
passed by a ruined aqueduct, and a convent in the 
same condition, and in about a mile's riding, came to 
the fountain of Elisha; so called, because miraculously 
purged from its brackishness by that prophet, at the 
request of the men of Jericho, 2 Kings ii. 19. Its 
waters are at present received in a basin, about nine 
or ten paces long, and five or six broad ; and from 
thence issuing out in good plenty, divide themselves 
into several small streams, dispersing their refreshment 
to all the field between this and Jericho, and rendering 
it exceeding fruitful. Close by the fountain grows 
a large tree spreading into boughs over the water ; 
and here in the shade we took a collation, with the 
father guardian, and about thirty or forty friars more, 
who went this journey with us. 

M At about one third of an hour's distance from 
hence is Jericho, at present only a poor nasty village 
of the Arabs. W e were here carried to see a place 
where Zaccheus's house is said to have stood ; which 
is only an old square stone building, on the south side 
of Jericho." 

According to Pococke, the mountains to which the 
absurd name of Quarantania has been arbitrarily given, 
are the highest in all Judea ; and he is probably cor- 
rect : they form part of a chain extending from Scy- 
thopolis into Idumea. The fountain of Elisha he 
states to be a soft water, rather warm ; he found in it 
some small shell-fish of the turbinated kind. Close by 
the ruined aqueduct are the remains of a fine paved 
way, with a fallen column, supposed to be a Roman 

curiosities he could find, whilst I gathered what plants and In- 
sects I could find below. Of the latter, I found a very curious and 
new cimex or bug! ! "—Travels, p. 128. 



228 PALESTINE; OR, 

milestone. The hills nearest to Jerusalem consist, 
according to Hasselqnist, of a very hard limestone; 
and different sorts of plants are found on them, in par- 
ticular the myrtle, the carob-tree, and the turpentine- 
tree ; but further towards Jericho, they are bare and 
barren, the hard limestone giving way to a looser kind, 
sometimes white and sometimes greyish, with inter- 
jacent layers of a reddish micaceous stone (saxum 
purum micaceum). The vales, though now bare and 
uncultivated, and full of pebbles, contain good red 
mould, which would amply reward the husbandman's 
toil. Nothing can be more savage than the present 
aspect of these wild and gloomy solitudes — the very 
road in which is laid the scene of that exquisite 
parable, the Good Samaritan, * and from that time to 
the present, the haunt of the most desperate bandits, 
being one of the most dangerous in Palestine. Some- 
times the track leads along the edges of cliffs and pre- 
cipices, which threaten destruction on the slightest 
false step: at other times it winds through craggy 
passes, overshadowed by projecting or perpendicular 
rocks. At one place, the road has been cut through, 
the very apex of a hill, the rocks overhanging it on 
either side. Here, in 1820, an English traveller, Sir 
Frederick Henniker, was attacked by the Arabs with 
fire-arms, who stripped him naked, and left him 
severely wounded. " It was past mid-day, and burn- 
ing hot," says Sir Frederick; "I bled profusely ; and 
two vultures, whose business it is to consume corpses, 
were hovering over me. I should scarcely have had 
strength to resist, had they chosen to attack me." At 

* Luke x. 30. " A certain man went down from Jerusalem to 
Jericho, and fell among thieves (robbers), who stripped him of his 
raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half -dead." 



THE HOLY LAND. 



229 



length the janissary who attended him, and who had 
galloped away in panic fear, returned, together with 
his Greek servant : they lifted him on a horse, and he 
was thus carried to Jericho, where the secretary of the 
governor, " the only Christian" there, provided him 
with a shirt ; and some women, who came with their 
pitchers to the pool near which he was laid, in spite of 
his being a Christian, brought him a lemon and some 
milk, — -justifying the testimony borne by Mungo 
Parke to the universal character of woman. The 
monks have given the name of the field of Abdonim, 
or blood, to a small, round, grassy valley, which they 
have been pleased to fix upon as the real spot where 
the facts supposed in the parable took place ; and 
here, two hundred years ago, Brocardus " fell among 
thieves." * 

The modern village of Jericho is described by Mr. 
Buckingham as a settlement of about fifty dwellings, 
all very mean in their appearance, and fenced in front 
with thorny bushes, while a barrier of the same kind, 
the most effectual that could be raised against mounted 
Arabs, encircles the town. A fine brook flows by it, 
which empties itself into the Jordan: the nearest point 
of that river is about three miles distant. The grounds 
in the immediate vicinity of the village, being fertilized 
by this stream, bear crops of dourra, Indian corn, rice, 
and onions. The population is entirely Mahommedan, 
and is governed by a sheikh ; their habits are those of 
Bedouins, and robbery and plunder form their chief 
and most gainful occupation. They call the place 
Rihhah, which signifies in Arabic Odour ; and it is 
from the near correspondence of this name of the 
place, both in sound and signification, to the Hebrew 



* Quaresmius, cited by Henniker, p. 285. 



230 



PALESTINE; OR, 



Rahab, (the name of the harlot who here entertained 
the spies sent by Joshua) that it has been considered 
as the identical site of Jericho, notwithstanding that 
not a trace remains of the ancient city.* 

Three or four miles, however, nearer Jerusalem, at 
the very foot of the mountains, Mr. Buckingham 
noticed the ruins of apparently a place of consequence. 
Several large tumuli were observed, evidently the work 
of art ; and near them " a large square area, enclosed 
by long and regular mounds," seeming to mark the 
course of the walls. Foundations of walls, shafts of 
columns, and a capital of the Corinthian order, are 
described as lying in other directions. It is here, 
he thinks, rather than at Rihhah, that the site of 
Jericho must be fixed ; its local situation, as well as its 
distance from Jerusalem, exactly answering to the 
description given by J osephus of the once flourishing 
" city of palms."-]- At the present time there is not 
a tree of any description, either palm or balsam, and 
scarcely any verdure to be seen about the spot ; but 
for this, the desolations of war, the want of water 
occasioned by the destruction of the aqueducts, and 
the neglect of cultivation, sufficiently account, as the 

* <( the famous city of Jericho, but at present so far from 

retaining any thing of its former lustre, that one would question 
whether there had ever been a city or town thereabouts ; all that 
is now to be seen being only some hovels of dried mud, the dwell- 
ings of husbandmen and shepherds." —Van Egmont's Travels, 
vol. i. p. 332. 

| " It is situated in a plain; but a naked and barren mountain 
of a very great length hangs over it, which extends itself to the 
land about Scythopolis northward, and as far as the country of 
Sodom and the utmost limit of the lake Asphaltites southward. 
This mountain is all of it very uneven, and uninhabited by reason 
of its barrenness." " This place is 150 furlongs from Jerusalem, 
and sixty from Jordan."— Joseph. Jew* Wars, lib. iv. cap. 8. 



THE HOLY LAND, 



231 



fertility of the soil depended entirely on irrigation. * 
The whole valley was once esteemed the most fruitful 
in Judea; and the obstinacy with which the Jews 
fought here to prevent the balsam-trees from falling 
into the possession of the Romans, attests the import- 
ance which was attached to them. This tree Pliny 
describes as peculiar to the vale of Jericho, and as 
" more like a vine than a myrtle." It was esteemed so 
precious a rarity, that both Fompey and Titus can-ied 
a specimen to Rome in triumph ; and the balsam, 
owing to its scarcity, sold for double its weight in 
silver, till its high price led to the practice of adultera- 
tion. Justin makes it the chief source of the national 
wealth. He describes the country in which it grew, 
as a valley like a garden, environed with continual 
hills, and, as it were, enclosed with a wall. " The 
space of the valley contains 200,000 acres, and is called 
Jericho. In that valley, there is wood as admirable 
for its fruitfulness as for its delight, for it is inter- 
mingled with palm-trees and opobalsamum. The trees 
of the opobalsamum have a resemblance to fir-trees ; -|- 
but they are lower, and are planted and husbanded 
after the manner of vines. On a set season of the 
year they sweat balsam. $ The darkness of the place 
is besides as wonderful as the fruitfulness of it ; for 
although the sun shines nowhere hotter in the world, 
there is naturally a moderate and perpetual gloominess 

* <( Locus ferax, palmis abundans, totus irriguus." — Strabo. 

f Strabo describes it as resembling the turpentine-tree and the 
laburnum — " cytiso et terebintho, persimilis" 

% Josephus says : "the sprouts being cut with sharp stones, at 
the incisions they gather the juice, which drops down like tears." 
— Jew. Wars, book i. chap. 7. Strabo describes it as resembling 
milk, but it became thicker from standing ; and he speaks of its 
aromatic odour. 



232 



PALESTINE; OH, 



of the air." According to Mr. Buckingham, this 
description is most accurate. " Both the heat and 
the gloominess, " he says, " were observed by us, 
though darkness would be an improper term to apply 
to this gloom." 

In a small wood to the south-east of Jericho, 
Dr. Pococke noticed another singular shrub, which he 
supposes to be the myrobalanum of Josephus and 
Pliny. It is called by him the zoccum-tree ; but 
Maundrell, describing apparently the same " thorny 
bush," says that the Arabs call it zacho-ne. The 
bark is like that of the holly ; it has very strong 
thorns, and the leaf is something like that of the 
Barbary tree. It bears a green nut resembling, both 
in shape and colour, a small unripe walnut : it is 
ribbed, has a thick shell, and a very small kernel. 
Maundrell says, that the Arabs bray the kernels in 
a mortar, and then, putting the pulp into scalding 
water, skim off the oil which rises. Pococke's account 
varies : they grind the whole, he tells us, and press 
an oil out of it, as they do out of olives, and call it a 
balsam. " This oil they take inwardly for bruises," 
adds the former traveller, " and apply it outwardly 
to green wounds, preferring it before balm of Gilead. 
I procured a bottle of it, and have found it upon 
small trials a very healing medicine." What is called 
the rose of J ericho, a species of thlaspi^ was not to be 
found at that season. 

Beyond the modern village of Rihhah, the plain 
extending to the Jordan becomes very barren, pro- 
ducing nothing but a kind of samphire and other 
marine plants. " I observed," says Maundrell, " in 
many places of the road, where puddles of water had 
stood, a whiteness upon the surface of the ground, 
which, upon trial, I found to be a crust of salt, caused 



THE HOLY LAND. 



233 



by the water to rise out of the earth, in the same 
manner as it does every year in the Valley of Salt 
near Aleppo, after the winter's inundation. These 
saline efflorescences I found at some leagues' distance 
from the Dead Sea ; which demonstrates that the 
whole valley must be all over plentifully impregnated 
with that mineral." Chateaubriand compares the 
appearance of the soil to the bottom of a sea that 
had long retired from its bed, — " a beach covered with 
salt, dry mud and moving sands, furrowed as it were 
by the waves. Here and there, stunted shrubs with 
difficulty vegetate upon this inanimate tract ; their 
leaves are covered with salt, which has nourished them, 
and their bark has a smoky smell and taste. Instead 
of villages you perceive the ruins of a few towers. 
Through the middle of this valley flows a discoloured 
river, which reluctantly creeps towards the pestilential 
lake by which it is engulfed. Its course amid the 
sands can be distinguished only by the willows and 
the reeds that border it ; and the Arab lies in ambush 
among these reeds, to attack the traveller, and to 
plunder the pilgrim." 

Less poetical, but more distinct, is the account 
given by the Swedish Naturalist. He reached the 
Jordan at three leagues' distance from the Dead Sea. 
The river was then about eight paces over; " the 
shores perpendicular, six feet high ; the water deep, 
muddy, rather warm than cold, and much inferior in 
goodness to the Nile. On the shores grew rhamnus, 
vitex agnus castus, a willow of which pilgrims make 
staves. The plain reaches to the Dead Sea, and is 
three leagues long, level, with some small rising- 
grounds * in different places, between which are nar- 

* Maundrell says, these hillocks resemble those places in Eng- 
land where there have been anciently lime-kilns. « Whether 



234 PALESTINE; OH, 

row vales, uncultivated and barren. - The soil is a 
greyish, sandy clay, so loose that our horses often 
sunk up to the knees in it. The whole surface of the 
earth was covered with salt, in the same manner as in 
Egypt. The soil, therefore, is Egyptian, and might 
be as fruitful if it were tilled ; and without doubt it 
was so in the time of the Israelites. The river had 
thrown up a quantity of willow at its mouth. The 
shore consists of the same clay as the plain we had 
passed over. In several places were perpendicular 
strata of a reddish brittle earth, which will, without 
doubt, in time become slate inclosed in limestone. 
The stones on the shore were all quartz, of different 
colours and sizes." 

About half a mile from the river Jordan, near the 
part where the Latin pilgrims bathe, there are the 
ruins of a church and convent dedicated to John the 
Baptist, — " founded," says Maundrell, " as near as 
could be conjectured, on the very place where he had 
the honour to perform his sacred office." The schis- 
matical Greeks, however, are of a different opinion, 
and where the Latins turn to the N.E., they turn 
to the S.E., to a part of the river three or four miles 
lower down. The convent was built chiefly of hewn 
stone, on the brow of a descent over the plain ; and 
" it is thought" that formerly the river Jordan over- 
flowed to the foot of this height. But, says Pococke, 
" as the banks are about fifteen feet high, I should 
hardly have imagined that it ever overflowed them, 
nor could I be informed that it does at present." The 
learned traveller is here speaking of the higher or 
outer bank of the river, from which there is a descent 

these might be the pits at which the kings of Sodom and Gomor- 
rah were overthrown by the four kings, Gen. xiv. 10, i will not 
determine." 



THE HOLY LAND. 



235 



in many places to a lower ground, only four or five 
feet above the water. There is no doubt that an- 
ciently, at certain seasons, (in particular in the first 
month of the Hebrew year, March,) the river over- 
flowed its inner bank.* But at present, says Maun- 
drell, " whether it be because the river has, by its 
rapidity of current, worn its channel deeper than it 
was formerly, or whether because its waters are di- 
verted some other way, it seems to have forgot its 
ancient greatness ; for we could discern no sign or 
probability of such overflowings when we were there, 
which was the 30th of March, being the proper time 
for these inundations. Nay, so far was the river from 
overflowing, that it ran at least two yards below the 
brink of its channel." Pococke was there at the same 
time of year, the last week in March ; Hasselquist 
about a fortnight later ; Chateaubriand in October. 
This accounts for his different account of the current 
of the Jordan, which he represents as sluggish, — re- 
luctantly creeping to the Dead Sea. Pococke describes 
it, on the contrary, as " deep and very rapid, wider 
than the Tiber at Rome, and perhaps about as wide 
as the Thames at Windsor ; the water turbid." He 
adds, that the pilgrims who dip in the river are obliged 
to hold by the boughs of the trees, u because the bank 
is both soft and steep, and the stream so rapid, that 
there is some danger of being carried away by it, if 
any one ventured in without holding by the boughs; 
for in that case a person must be skilful in swimming, 
in order to recover the bank, some pilgrims having 
been drowned, who unadvisedly ventured into the 
river." The women, therefore, stand on the bank, 
and " being stripped to their under-garment, get the 



* Joshua iii. 15. 1 CI iron. xii. 15* Jer. zii. 5. 



236 



PALESTINE; OR, 



people to pour the water on them. The Rev. Mr. 
Connor, who accompanied the Greek pilgrims to the 
Jordan, in April 1820, says that, at the spot where 
they bathed, the water appeared turbid, but not deep. 
Its breadth, he thinks, may be about twenty yards, 
" Some Turkish horsemen dashed through the river, 
and rode to and fro in the grove on the opposite side, 
to protect the pilgrims from the guns of the Bedouins, 
many of whom were assembled to watch the cere- 
mony." The Jordan here, he adds, is beautifully 
picturesque. Van Egmont too says : " The Greeks 
and Armenians, both men, women, and children, rush 
into this river with the greatest raptures ; and some, 
who affect a more than ordinary devotion, have water 
poured on their heads, in memory of our Saviour's 
baptism." He notices the remarkable rapidity of the 
current. But this apparent contradiction is easily 
reconciled. Pococke accompanied the Latin pilgrims 
to a part of the river, between three and four miles 
higher up, where the stream is narrower, and conse- 
quently deeper and more rapid. The Greeks have 
chosen the more convenient bathing-place. 

The periodical rise of the river must vary, indeed, 
according to the duration or quantity of the rains ; 
but it is still very considerable, although, according 
to MaundrelPs accurate conjecture, its channel is no 
doubt worn deeper, and it may have suffered a dimi- 
nution in its waters from other circumstances. Mr. 
Buckingham crossed the Jordan in the last week in 
January : the river was then at its lowest ebb, flowing 
between banks fourteen or fifteen feet high. At the 
point where he crossed, which was a little more to the 
northward, it did not appear above twenty-five yards 
in breadth, and was easily fordable by horses. The 
stream was still " exceeding rapid," but 3 " from its 



THE HOLY LAND. 



237 



flowing over a bed of pebbles, tolerably clear" and 
sweet. Assuming these various statements to be cor- 
rect, it would seem that, between the end of January 
and the end of March, the Jordan rises at this part, 
from nine to ten perpendicular feet — a height quite 
sufficient to produce a very extensive inundation, 
when its channel was shallower. This rise appears to 
be rapid, being occasioned by the mountain torrents 
formed by the early and the latter rains. The second 
bank (which is, according to Maundrell, about a 
furlong distant from the outer one, but the width of 
this lower plain varies) is " so beset with bushes and 
trees, such as tamarisk, willows, oleander, &c, that 
you can see no water till you have made your way 
through them. In this thicket anciently," he adds, 
u and the same is reported of it at this day, several 
sorts of wild beasts were wont to harbour themselves ; 
whose being washed out of the covert by the over- 
flowings of the river, gave occasion to that allusion, 
J er. xlix. 1 9 ; 1. 44. ' He shall come up like a lion 
from the swelling of Jordan.' On the other side 
there seemed to be a much, larger thicket than on that 
where we were." 

Mr. Buckingham was informed by his Arab guides, 
that, about a day's journey to the southward of 
Jericho, at the foot of the mountains, is a place called 
Merthah, " supposed to be the site of a city of the 
giants," where there are many sepulchral caves, from 
which had been taken human skulls and bones of at 
least three times the size of those of the human race 
at the present day : these the Arabs professed to have 
themselves seen and handled. Mr. Buckingham con- 
jectures that this Merthah may be the Maresha or 
Marissa of Josephus. Mareshah was among the cities 
built or fortified by Rehoboam : it was in the tribe 



338 PALESTINE; OR, 

of Judah, and apparently not far from Hebron.* The 
Jewish historian mentions the bones of giants that 
were in his time shewn near the latter city. 

At about two hours' distance northward of Rihhah, 
Mr. Buckingham noticed the ruins of a fine Roman 
aqueduct, at the distance of a mile to his left : there 
appeared to be about twenty arches still perfect. In 
this direction was Cypros, one of the cities built by 
Herod, and named in honour of his mother. Near 
this spot, too, our traveller remarks, must have stood 
the ancient city of Ai or Hai,-|- which was to the east 
of Bethel, that lay in the hills. Proceeding about half 
an hour further to the north, over the same kind of 
plain, "we opened on our left," says this same travel* 
ler, " a beautiful valley, now highly cultivated, and 
spread over with a carpet of the freshest verdure, 
seemingly of young corn. This place, we are told, is 
called Waad-el-Farah, or the Valley of Farah ; and 
a town was spoken of near it, in the side of the hill, 
bearing the same name, and larger and more populous 
than Rihhah." The situation corresponds, apparently, 
to that of Phasaelus, a city in the Valley of Jericho, 
built by Herod, and named in honour of his brother. J 
At this point, which they estimated to be little more 
than six milos north of Rihhah, the travellers turned 
eastward to cross the Jordan ; where, for the present, 
we leave them, and, returning to the Jewish capital, 
prepare to set out for Galilee, and the shores of the 
far-famed Lake of Tiberias, in our way to which we 
must needs pass through Samaria. § Here we shall 

* Jos. Antiq. lib. xii. cap. 8 ; lib. xiii. cap. 15. 
t Gen. xii. 8 ; xiii. 3. Josh. vii. 2 ; viii. 12. Ezra ii. 28. Nek 
vii. 32. 

t Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 88. § John iv, 4, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



239 



again join company with Dr. Richardson, who, in the 
suite of Earl Belmore, took this route to Damascus. 

ROUTE TO NABLOUS AND TIBERIAS. 

For some hours after leaving Jerusalem, the route 
to the north lies over a rugged and mountainous 
country, which, though susceptible of cultivation by 
being terraced,* now presents an aspect of frightful 
nakedness and sterility. The road, if it may be 
called such, is rough and stony; and no object of 
interest occurs before the traveller arrives at Beer, 
which is three hours and a half (about ten miles) from 
Jerusalem. The name of the place is derived from 
its well, which Beer signifies. It seems, Dr. Richard- 
son says, to have been once a place of considerable 
consequence; and Maundrell supposed it to be the 
Beer referred to Judges ix. 21, to which Jotham fled 
from the revenge of Abimeleeh. " It is supposed 
also," he adds, " to be the same with Michmash, 

* " For the husbanding of these mountains, their manner was, 
to gather up the stones, and place them in several lines, along the 
sides of hills, in form of a wall. By such borders they supported 
the mould from tumbling, or being washed down ; and formed 
many beds of excellent soil, rising gradually one above another, 
from the bottom to the top of the mountains. Of this form of 
culture you see evident footsteps wherever you go in all the 
mountains of Palestine. Thus the very rocks were made fruit- 
ful. The hills, though improper for all cattle, except goats, yet, 
being disposed into such beds as are before described, served very 
well to bear corn, melons, gourds, cucumbers, and such like garden- 
stuff, which make the principal food of these countries for seve- 
ral months in the year. The most rockv parts of all, which could 
not well be adjusted in that manner for the production of corn, 
might yet serve for the plantation of vines and olive-trees, which 
delight to extract, the one its fatness, the other its sprightly juice 
chiefly out of such dry and flinty places.".— Maun drell's Journey 
from Aleppo, Sjc% 



240 



PALESTINE; OR, 



1 Sam. xiv. 5." But Reland, on the authority of 
Eusebius, places Michmash nearer Jerusalem, in the 
direction of Rama. Close to the well, which is at 
the bottom of the declivity on which stands the vil- 
lage, are the mouldering" walls of a ruined khan ; and 
on the summit of the hill, two large arches still remain 
of a ruined convent — Maundrell calls it an old church, 
and says it was built by the empress Helena, in com- 
memoration of the Virgin's coming as far as this spot 
in quest of the child Jesus, as related Luke x. 24 ! 
A little beyond Beer two roads meet: that on the 
right conducts to Nablous. " After two hours' travel- 
ling along the same rocky path," says Dr. Richardson, 
" we passed the village of Einbroot, which is finely 
situated on our left, on the top of a hill. The ad- 
joining valley is well cultivated, and the sides of the 
hills are raised in terraces, and planted with the olive, 
the vine, and the fig-tree. On approaching Einbroot, 
the guide of the caravan called out for us to march 
in close order. Here it was reported that we were in 
danger of being attacked by banditti, and that the 
muskets were seen pointed at us over the stones ; but 
upon the guide, who rode considerably in advance, 
informing them who the party were whom they meant 
to attack, that they travelled under the protection of 
a firman from the Porte and the pasha of Acre, and, 
what was, perhaps, as powerful a dissuasive, that we 
were armed, and could fight as well as they could, 
they withdrew their weapons of offence, and remained 
quiet. A little further on we passed two villages on 
our left, the names of which I did not learn.* The 
road lay partly through a rocky dell, and partly 
through a narrow cultivated valley; but the general 

* Maundrell mentions an Arab village, which he calls Selwid, 
a little beyond Geeb, and on the same side of the route. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



aspect ©f the country was particularly wild and barren. 
The next village that we passed was called Engeeb, 
also on the top of a hill on the left, and the adjoining 
ground was well cultivated in the same manner. After 
this, we passed a fine-looking picturesque hill, every 
way susceptible of cultivation, at the foot of which 
we entered the small valley of Khan Leban, where we 
found the ruins of an old khan, with many mouldering 
vaults, and a plentiful spring of clear water, much 
infested with small worms. It derives its name from 
a village called Leban, at the other end of the valley. 
It is eight hours from Jerusalem. Here we pitched 
our tents for the night, the place being agreeable and 
convenient, with plenty of grass for the animals. 

Maundrell describes this spot as " a delicious vale," 
and says, that either Khan Leban, which is on the 
eastern side, or the village which is on the opposite 
side, is supposed to be the site of the ancient Lebo- 
nah. He notices also a village called Cinga, lying 
at some distance on the traveller's left, about three 
quarters of an hour south of Khan Leban ; and, be- 
tween this and Engeeb, he describes a very narrow 
valley between two high rocky hills, where he found 
the ruins of a village and a monastery, supposed to 
mark the site of the ancient Bethel, which was on the 
confines of Ephraim and Benjamin. The monastery 
is almost sufficient to awake the suspicion that this 
was not Bethel : possibly, the Arabs, who are the 
best authorities, could decide the point, as they have 
almost uniformly preserved the ancient names. But 
neither the empress Helena nor the monks ever 
thought of consulting them. 

M Having passed the village of Leban," continues 
Dr. Richardson, " the road, winding with the valley, 
proceeds in a northern direction. Here the ground 

PART II. P 



242 



PALESTINE; OH, 



is rich and well cultivated, and several ploughs were 
busily engaged. We next passed the village of Zanio, 
and, travelling for a considerable time over a moun- 
tainous and barren track, descended into a fertile 
valley, where we found the reapers cutting down an 
excellent crop of barley. Here are three comfortable - 
looking villages near each other ; the first is named 
Cousa, the second Anabous, and the third Couara. 
We are now about two hours and a half from Nablous. 
The ground in this valley is remarkably stony, but 
well cultivated. Having ascended the hill, we passed 
on our right the tomb of the patriarch Joseph, situated 
in the plain below. It is now a Turkish oratory 
with a whitened dome, like the tomb of his mother 
Rachel on the road between Jerusalem and Bethle- 
hem. At a little distance, in the same plain, and 
nearer to the mountain, probably Gerizim, we saw 
another building resembling the tomb of an Arab 
sheikh, and said to be J acob's W ell. At the top of 
the hill we opened a fine olive grove, with a stream of 
water in front of it. Here, being anxious to have a 
view of Jacob's Well, we proceeded across the field 
in that direction, but had not advanced far before we 
were assailed by prohibitory calls from a small fort 
on the side of the hill ; to which, however, as we did 
not understand them, we, at first, paid no attention ; 
but the calls were speedily followed by the discharge 
of a musket fired across our front. This arrested 
our progress, and drew our attention to the place from 
which it came. Upon this the calls were redoubled, 
and our guide coming up informed us, that we were 
addressed by the guard who was placed there to keep 
the pass, and that we could not proceed to Jacob's 
Well. We had previously been informed that the 
Arabs around Nablous were in arms against the 



THE HOLY LAND. 243 



governor ; but this is the only specimen of Turkish 
vigilance that occurred to us on the road. We saw 
no symptoms of rebellion among the Arabs." 

Here again the question presents itself, Is this the 
well of the patriarch whose name it now bears ? Who 
gave it this name, the natives or the Christians? 
Dr. Clarke, who can be sometimes incredulous, but 
at other times very confiding, says, that 64 this is 
allowed by all writers" to be the spot referred to, 
John iv. 6, where our Saviour had the memorable 
conference with the Samaritan woman. The con- 
currence of 44 all writers" cannot throw the least light 
on the fact ; as one after another has but repeated the 
legend handed down from the days of that "great and 
devout patroness of the Holy Land," as honest Maun- 
drell slyly calls the empress Helena, who is said to 
have built a church over the well of which 44 a few 
foundations" * were then remaining. This faithful 
traveller, however, notices as a difficulty, the distance 
at which this well is situated from the modern city. 
44 If it should be questioned," he says, "whether this 
be the very well that it is pretended for, or no, seeing 
it may be suspected to stand too remote from Sychar 
for women to come so far to draw water, it is an- 
swered, that probably the city extended further this 
way in former times than it does now, as may be 
conjectured from some pieces of a very thick wall still 
to be seen not far from hence. These pieces of wall, 
are but a sorry voucher for the supposed extension of 
the city eastward, so far beyond the present walls ; -j- 

* Mr. Buckingham says, " some shafts of granite pillars, all 
the rest lying in one undistinguished heap of ruins," 

t This supposition is, indeed, at once overthrown by Mr. 
Buckingham's statement, that between this well and the town 
are some ancient sepulchres, which must have been without the 
city. 



244 



PALESTINE; OR, 



and they are quite as likely to be the work of the said 
empress. The simple circumstance of the distance 
of this well from Sychar (above a mile), would not, 
however, disprove its identity, were there no springs 
nearer the town, or were there no other reason for 
hesitation. But Mr. Buckingham states, that, on in- 
quiring of the inhabitants for the Bir (or Beer) el 
Yakoab, he was told by everybody that this was in 
the town. As this information did not correspond to 
the " described place of the well," it led to further 
explanation ; and, " at length by telling the stor^ 
attached to it, we found," he says, " it was known 
here only by the name of Beer Samareea, or the Well 
of Samaria." It is not a little singular, that this 
traveller should not, so far as appears, have visited 
what now bears the name of Jacob's Well. That 
name may have been arbitrarily or ignorantly given 
to it by the Turks ; otherwise, it would be highly 
deserving of attention. It is plain, from the narative 
of St. John, that Jacob's Well, where our Lord rested 
while the disciples went forward into the city to buy 
meat, was at some short distance from Sychar ; and 
consequently, the Beer el Yakoab, if absolutely within 
the town, can hardly be entitled to the appellation. 
Mr. Buckingham notices, however, a third well, " not 
far from the Well of Samaria," called the Beer Yusef, 
or Joseph's Well, over which there is a modern build- 
ing ; and M it is said to be even at this day frequented 
for water from Nablous." The Well of Samaria 
might, therefore, he remarks, also have been so from 
Sychar. But if this third well really derives its name 
from the patriarch Joseph, to whom Jacob gave the 
parcel of ground containing the place of sepulchre 
" before the city,"* it is very possible that this Beer 

* Gen. xxxiii. 18, 19. Josh. xxiv. 32. John iv. 5. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



245 



Yusef may be the well on which our Lord sat : it 
would be correctly referred to as Jacob's Well by the 
evangelist, although it bore the name of his son. It 
must be left to future travellers to decide on the pro- 
babilities of the case. In the meantime, we return to 
the account given us of the " Well of Samaria." 

Having procured a Christian boy for a guide, Mr. 
Buckingham left Nablous by the eastern gate, and 
after passing along the valley for about a quarter of 
an hour, he arrived at the spot where the pass opens 
into a more extensive vale, the mountains on the 
other side of the Jordan being in sight on the left. 
Here he had on each side grottoes and tombs, which 
we shall presently notice ; and from hence, in another 
quarter of an hour, he reached the Well of Samaria.* 
<c It stands," he says, "at the commencement of the 
round vale which is thought to be the parcel of ground 
bought by Jacob, and which, like the narrow valley 
west of Nablous, is rich and fertile. The mouth of 
the well itself had an arched or vaulted building over 
it ; and the only passage down to it at this moment 
is by a small hole in the roof, scarcely large enough 
for a moderate-sized person to work himself through." 
Taking off his large Turkish clothes, our traveller 
descended with a lighted taper, but even then did not 
get down without bruising himself against the sides. 
" Nor was I," he says, " at all rewarded for such an 
inconvenience by the sight below. Landing on a heap 
of dirt and rubbish, we saw a large, flat, oblong stone, 
which lay almost on its edge across the mouth of the 
well, and left barely space enough to see that there 
was an opening below. We could not ascertain its 
diameter, but, by the time of a stone's descent, it was 

* Maundrell makes * 'Jacob's Well" " about one third of an hour 
from Naplosa." 

P 2 



246 PALESTINE ; OR, 

evident that it was of considerable depth, as well as 
that it was perfectly dry at this season (Feb.), the 
fall of the stone giving forth a dead and hard sound." * 
Maundrell removed the " broad flat stone" which lay 
on the mouth, and examined the well more minutely. 
u It is," he says, " dug in a firm rock, and contains 
about three yards in diameter and thirty-five in depth ; 
five of ivhich we found full of water J >y This was the 
latter end of March. " This confutes a story," he 
adds, " commonly told to travellers, who do not take 
the pains to examine the well, viz. that it is dry all 
the year round, except on the anniversary of that day 
on which our blessed Saviour sat upon it, but then 
bubbles up with abundance of water." One would 
imagine, that the tc old stone vault" built over the 
spot was designed to protect the legend, rather than 
the well, by concealing it from examination. If this 
were really the well to which the inhabitants of Sychar 
were accustomed to resort, it would be difficult to ac- 
count for its having been thus abandoned. 

Nablous (as it is pronounced by the Turks and 
Arabs, or Naplosa, as the Christians who speak Italian 
call it — a corruption of Neapolis, or New Town) is 
one of the few places in the Holy Land, the ancient 
name of which appears to be superseded by that 
which it has received from its foreign conquerors. 
Its position identifies the site, beyond all question, 
with the Shechem of the Old Testament -f- and the 
Sychar (or Sichem, as Jerome contends it should be) 
of the New, the ancient capital of Samaria. Josephus 
says, that the natives called it Mabartha, but by 
others it was commonly called Neapolis. J Few places 

* Buckingham's Travels, 8vo. vol. ii. p. 460. 

t Gen. xxxiil. 18 ; xxxvii. 13. Josh. xxiv. 32. Judges ix. 

£ Joseph. Wars, book iv. chap. 8; book v. chap. 4. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



247 



exceed it in the romantic beauty of its position. It is 
situated in the narrow valley between Mount Ebal 
and Mount Gerizim, having the former on the north, 
and the latter on the south ; but it is correctly de- 
scribed by Maundrell as lying under Mount Gerizim, 
being built at the acclivity on the southern side of the 
valley. It was from Mount Gerizim that God com- 
manded the blessings to be pronounced upon the 
children of Israel, and from Mount Ebal the curses, 
respectively annexed to obedience and disobedience, 
on their entering the promised land by way of Jericho 
and Ai : half of the tribes were to be encamped over 
against the one hill, and half over against the other. * 
The modern town consists of two long streets, running 
through the centre of the valley, and intersected by 
several smaller ones, mostly crossing them at right 
angles. At the present time it is populous and 
flourishing, and the environs bear the marks of opu-: 
lence and industry, being adorned with small gardens 
that skirt the banks of the stream by which the valley 
is watered. " We passed," says Dr. Richardson, 
" its scarcely moistened bed, and a little above the 
town saw an ancient bridge with twelve arches, which 
were still capable of maintaining the communication 
between the two sides of the valley." Dr. Clarke, 
in approaching it from Jennin, was struck with its 
flourishing appearance. " There is nothing in the 
Holy Land finer," he affirms, " than the view of 
Napolose from the heights around it. As the traveller 
descends towards it from the hills, it appears luxuri- 
antly embosomed in the most delightful and fragrant 
bowers, half concealed by rich gardens, and by stately 
trees collected into groves all around the bold and 

'* Deut. xi. 29; xxvii. 12, 13. Josh. viii. 33. 



248 



PALESTINE; OR, 



beautiful valley in which, it stands." u Within 
the town are six mosques, five baths, one Christian 
church of schismatic Greeks, an excellent covered 
bazar for fine goods, and an open one for provisions, 
besides numerous cotton-cloth manufactories, and shops 
of every description." * Dr. Clarke says, the prin- 
cipal trade is in soap; but the manufactures of the 
town supply a very widely extended neighbourhood. 
The water-melons too of Nablous are equal, he says, 
to those of Jaffa. The resident population is supposed 
to amount to 10,000, though Mr. Buckingham thinks 
this is rather over-rating the numbers. These are 
almost all Mahommedans, the Greek Christians scarcely 
amounting, he says, to fifty. But Mr. Connor states 
that there are about a hundred. They have one 
church and two priests. Though the commerce is so 
considerable, there are few Jews, owing perhaps to a 
religious prejudice against the place ; Mr. Bucking- 
ham says, none among the permanent residents, 

Mr. Connor says, " about fifteen individuals." Of 
the Samaritans, of whom a respectable remnant existed 
here so late as the time of Maundrell's journey, about 
a century ago, -f- the reverend gentleman last men- 
tioned gives the following interesting account. " I 
immediately made inquiry about the Samaritans, My 
host stepped ont, and fetched their prie3t : he sat with 
me some time : his name is Shalmor ben Tabiah : he 
is a native of Napolose, and is about forty years of 
age. 

* Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 433. 
In the Itinerary of Rabbi Benjamin, Nablous is stated to 
contain above 100 Cutheans, or Samaritans. He mentions 
Cesarea as another place where there still remained a remnant 
(about 200) of this people. There are said to be still some 
descendants of the Samaritans at Gaza, Damascus, and Grand 
(Cairo. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



249 



" There are about forty Samaritans in Napolose. 
They have but one synagogue in the town, where they 
have service every Saturday. Four times a-year they 
go, in solemn procession, to the old synagogue on 
Mount Gerizim ; and, on these occasions, they go up 
before sunrise, and read the law till noon. On one 
of these days they kill six or seven rams. The Sa- 
maritans have one school in Napolose, where their 
language is taught. The head of the sect resides in 
Paris. 

" I accompanied the priest to his house, and sat a 
long time with him. There were several Jews pre- 
sent : they seem to live on friendly terms with the 
Samaritans here. The priest shewed me part of the 
first volume of the English Polyglott, mentioned by 
Maundrell : it consisted of about a dozen tattered 
leaves. He shewed me also a manuscript Samaritan 
Pentateuch, with an Arabic version at its side ; this 
version, however, is not used in their synagogue. He 
afterward took me to see the synagogue, making me 
first take ofi° my shoes : it is a small gloomy building. 
I observed a number of copies of the Samaritan Penta- 
teuch, carefully enveloped in linen, and laid on a shelf 
in the synagogue. Expressing a wish to see the 
ancient manuscript, said by the Samaritans to be 
3500 years old, the priest paused, and hesitated some 
time. I pressed him. Having laid aside his upper 
garments, he at length entered the sanctuary, and 
produced the venerated manuscript. It is well written 
on vellum, in the Samaritan character, and is pre- 
served in a tin roller : it bears the marks of age, and 
is rather tattered. The priest would not permit me, 
nor anyone present, to touch it. He was very in- 
quisitive about the Samaritans who, he had heard) 
were in England." 



250 



PALESTINE; OR, 



The accounts which we have of the ancient Sama- 
ritans, (or Cuthaeans, as they are called by the Jewish 
writers, from the founder of the sect, Sanballad, a 
Cuthite,) have come to us chiefly through their inve- 
terate enemies the Jews ; whose contempt and hatred 
were apparently excited by their being a mixed race, 
of doubtful genealogy, and schismatical in their creed. 
In rejecting the whole of the Old Testament excepting 
the Pentateuch, they were countenanced by the Sad- 
ducees. Our Lord, however, declares, that they 
worshipped they knew not what ; * which seems to 
imply that, although they cherished, in common with 
the Jews, the expectation of a Messiah, their worship 
had still an idolatrous tincture : they " feared the 
Lord," but, if they did not still " serve graven 
images," like their ancestors, •)- they did not worship 
God as a Spirit. Notwithstanding their enmity against 
the Jews, they joined in revolt against the Romans, 
and shared in the calamities of the guilty nation. 
After the fall of Jotapata and Jaffa, eleven thousand 
six hundred of them are stated to have posted them- 
selves on Mount Gerizim ; as if, like the Jews of 
Jerusalem, trusting to the protection of their temple, or 
resolved to perish on the sacred spot. The Roman 
general Cerealis, with 600 horsemen and 300 footmen, 
blockaded them here ; and after inviting them to sur- 
render, which they obstinately refused, put the greater 
part to the sword. Five centuries after the Christian 
era, the Samaritans, who still remained a distinct 
though motley race, had so increased in strength, that 
they rose in arms, under the standard of a desperate 
leader, to protect themselves against the persecution of 
the Emperor Justinian. They were, says Gibbon, 
" an ambiguous sect, rejected as Jews by, the Pagans, 
* John iv. 22. f 2 Kings xvii. 41. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



251 



by the Jews as schismatics, and by the Christians as 
idolaters. One hundred thousand, it has been com- 
puted, perished or were sold as captives in the Sama- 
ritan war, which converted the once fertile province 
into a wilderness."* A remnant, however, have 
always rallied on this consecrated spot, under the 
shadow of Mount Gerizim. In 1676, a correspond- 
ence took place between their chief-priest at Nablous 
and the learned Scaliger, on the differences between 
the Samaritan and Hebrew Pentateuchs, in the course 
of which information was elicited respecting the opi- 
nions then held by this ancient sect. The summary 
of their creed was to this effect : That they believe in 
God, and in the laws of his servant Moses ; they prac- 
tise circumcision ; keep the sabbath with all the rigour 
of a penance ; observe the Passover, the Pentecost, 
the feast of tabernacles, and the great fast of expiation 
most strictly ; and never offer any sacrifice but on 
Mount Gerizim. The head of their religion must 
reside at Shechem. In 1697, Mr. Maundrell had a 
personal conference with the Samaritan chief-priest, 
on the subject of a singular discrepancy between the 
text of the Samaritan Pentateuch and the received 
Hebrew text. The passage in question occurs Deut. 
xxvii. 4: "Therefore it shall be, when ye be gone 
over Jordan, that ye shall set up these stones, which 
I command you this day" (inscribed with the words of 
the law) " in Mount Ebal ; and thou shalt plaster 
them with plaster; and there shalt thou build an 
altar unto the Lord thy God." f The Samaritan 

• Gibbon, vol. vi. chap. 47 

f In agreement with this, Joshua is recorded to have subse- 
quently built the altar in Mount Ebal. Josh, viii. 30. The al- 
leged corruption of the text must, therefore, have been made in 
both places. 



252 



PALESTINE; OR, 



Pentateuch has Mount Gerizim in this place ; and the 
chief -priest contended that the J ews had maliciously 
altered the Hebrew text out of odium to the Samaritans ; 
" putting, for Gerizim, Ebal, upon no other account, 
but only because the Samaritans worshipped in the 
former mountain, which they would have for that 
reason not to be the true place appointed by God for 
his worship and sacrifice. To confirm this, he pleaded 
that Ebal was the mountain of cursing, Deut. xi. 29, 
and in its own nature an unpleasant place ; but, on 
the contrary, Gerizim was the mountain of blessing, 
by God's own appointment, and also in itself fertile 
and delightful ; from whence he inferred a probability 
that this latter must have been the true mountain 
appointed for those religious festivals, Deut. xxvii. 4, 
and not (as the Jews have corruptly written it) Hebal. 
We observed that to be in some measure true which 
he pleaded concerning the nature of both mountains ; 
for, though neither of the mountains has much to boast 
of as to their pleasantness, yet, as one passes between 
them, Gerizim seems to discover a somewhat more 
verdant, fruitful aspect than Ebal. The reason of 
which may be, because fronting towards the north, it 
is sheltered from tbe heat of the sun by its own shade ; 
whereas Ebal, looking southward, and receiving the 
sun that comes directly upon it, must, by consequence, 
be rendered more scorched and unfruitful. The Sa- 
maritan priest could not say that any of those great 
stones which God directed Joshua to set up, were 
now to be seen in Mount Gerizim ; which were they 
now extant, would determine the question clearly on 
his side." 

Both Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal deserve to 
be explored. Their altitude appeared to Mr. Bucking- 
ham to be nearly equal, not exceeding 7 or 800 feet 



THE HOLY LAND. 



253 



from the level of the valley, which is itself elevated. 
Captains Irby and Mangles are the only modern 
travellers who appear to have ascended either. They 
say : " We went to the summit of Mount Gerizim, 
and found the ruins of a large town, with a tank 
near a conspicuous sheikh's tomb." They do not 
appear, however, to have bestowed much attention 
on these ruins, among which some traces of their 
boasted temple must, one would imagine, be still 
discernible ; nor do they notice any synagogue there. 
Mount Ebal they did not ascend.* In the Itinerary 
of Benjamin of Tudela, the Cutheans are stated to 
offer sacrifice on Mount Gerizim, on an altar con- 
structed of stones brought from the Jordan by the 
children of Israel. He describes this mountain as 
full of fountains and gardens, and Ghebal (Ebal) 
as arid and rocky. As a topographical authority, 
the Itinerary is unquestionable. With regard to 
the point at issue, it may be thought only to state 
the matter agreeably to the Samaritan tradition. 
There is certainly much plausibility in the arguments 
in favour of the Samaritan text ; which, in many 
other instances of variation from the received text, 
is admitted by Biblical critics to preserve the ge- 
nuine reading. It is very probable, that a further 
collation of Hebrew MSS. will throw some light on 
the question. 

The town is governed by a Mutsellim, or Beg, 
subject to the Pasha of Damascus, and having under 
his command about 400 Arnaout soldiers. The pre- 
vailing costume is the Turkish dress : the women 
wear a coloured veil, concealing the whole face, as 

* Dr. Richardson says : " On Mount Ebal we saw a considerable 
village, and a large building like a ruined fort." But he did not 
ascend its summit. 

PART lit Q, 



254 PALESTINE; OR, 

in the towns of the Yemen ; the scarf thrown over 
the head and shoulders is of a yellowish white, 
with a deep red border. Nablous is in long. 35 9 
22' E. lat. 32° 16' N. ; and is thirty-four miles N. of 
J erusalem. 

The only object of antiquity noticed by travellers 
within the town, is the eastern front of a ruined 
church, the site of which is now occupied by one 
of the mosques. It presents a fine pointed arch, 
supported by Corinthian columns, the upper part 
highly ornamented, in the style of some of the 
Saracen doors in Cairo : within are seen plain granite 
pillars ; and the whole exhibits, Mr. Buckingham tells 
us, a singular mixture of orders, in the most grotesque 
taste. 

Just without the city, towards Jerusalem, is a small 
mosque, said to have been built over the sepulchre 
purchased by the patriarch Jacob, and bearing the 
name of Joseph's Sepulchre: it is at the foot of 
Mount Gerizim. Mr. Buckingham, noticing the 
Mahommedan buildings here, 66 either mosques or 
tombs," says, they are now called Mahmoodea. "On 
the left," he adds, " at the foot of Mount Ebal, were 
several well -hewn grottoes in the rock, some with 
arched, and others with square doors, most probably 
ancient sepulchres." They were called Khallat Roivgh- 
ban, which he interprets to mean, the retreats of 
hermits ; khallat meaning properly a castle, and 
roivghban being a name given in Syria to monks. 
These he had no time to examine, although the most 
interesting antiquities of the place. That these caves 
may have been used as places of retreat or ascetic 
seclusion, is very probable ; but there is no room to 
doubt their sepulchral character. They may, or may 
not, be of remote antiquity $ but of this description, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



255 



and not far distant, must have been the burial-place 
of Joseph, whose bones were brought up out of Egypt 
to be laid in Shechem. To the practice of burying in 
the sides of mountains, we have repeated references 
in the Old Testament. Abraham was buried in the 
Cave of Machpelah before Mamre ; Joshua, on the 
north side of the Hill of Gaash in Ephraim ; * Eleazar, 
the son of Aaron, in a hill within the same district ; 
and Aaron himself in Mount Hor.*j- The " parcel 
of ground" given by Jacob to his son, is generally 
supposed to be the " wide field," as Maundrell terms 
it, into which the Valley of Sichem opens at the Well 
of Samaria ; and which he describes as M exceeding 
verdant and fruitful," being watered with a fresh 
stream, rising between it and the town. The precise 
limits of this purchase it would be ridiculous to at- 
tempt to ascertain. All that we know is, that it was 
near Sichar, " before," or eastward of the city; that 
it contained a well — a possession of the greatest 
importance in those parts ; and, like " the field of 
Ephron" purchased by Abraham,^: a burying. place. 
A place of burial seems to have given a sacredness to 
the property in which it was situated, and to have 
rendered the inheritance inalienable ; it established a 
right of proprietorship, and, connected with this, what 
we should call a right of common to the neighbouring 
pastures. § Thus, we find the sons of Jacob leaving 
their father's residence in Hebron, to feed his flocks 
in Shechem, j| by virtue of this right, long after he 
had been compelled to remove from the neighbour- 
hood. The burial-place was, no doubt, (as that of 

* Gen. xxv. 9. Josh. xxiv. 22, 29. 

■f Num. xx. 28. Deut. x. 6. 

± Gen. xxiii. 17. § Gen. xxxiv. 5. 

|| Gen. xxxv ii. 12—14. 



256 PALESTINE; OR, 

Abraham and that of Joshua were,) at the " end of 
the field," on the " border of the inheritance," which 
must have been Mount Gerizim itself ; and, if the 
mosque should prove to conceal the entrance to a 
lateral excavation or grotto, of the kind universally 
chosen for sepulchres of distinguished persons by the 
ancient Jews, it may possibly mark the identical 
place " in Shechem where the bones of Joseph were 
laid." 

Next to Jerusalem itself, this is, perhaps, the most 
interesting spot in the Holy Land, as connected with 
those events transacted in the fields of Sichem, which, 
from our earliest years, are remembered with delight. 
" Along the valley," says Dr. Clarke, " we beheld 
a company of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, as in 
the days of Reuben and Judah, ' with their camels, 
bearing spicery, and balm, and myrrh,'* who would 
gladly have purchased another Joseph of his brethren, 
and conveyed him, as a slave, to some Potiphar in 
Egypt. Upon the hills around, flocks and herds were 
feeding as of old ; nor, in the simple garb of the 
shepherds of Samaria, was there any thing to contra- 
dict the notions we may entertain of the appearance 
formerly exhibited by the sons of Jacob." " The 
morning after our arrival, we met caravans coming 
from Grand Cairo, and noticed others reposing in the 
large olive-plantations near the gates." 

Leaving Nablous, the road lies along the narrow 
vale, and, in about three quarters of an hour, conducts 
the traveller to a copious spring of good water, called 
Beer-sheba. This, Dr. Rich^vdcon says, is the 
broadest and best cultivated pait of the valley; he 
saw the natives busily engaged (May) in reaping a 



* Gen. xxx vii. 25. 



TttE HOLY LAND. 



25? 



scanty crop of barley. Maundrell notices a village 
on the left of the road (going northwards) called 
Barseba, deriving its name, no doubt, from this well ; 
and, half an hour further, another village which he 
calls Sherack. After leaving Beer-sheba, Dr. Richard- 
son's account makes the road ascend. " In about a 
quarter of an hour," he says, " we reached the top 
of the hill ; and as we wound our way down the other 
side, had an excellent view of the delightfully situated 
Sebaste. In a few minutes we passed a ruined aque- 
duct of Roman architecture, and pitched our tents at 
the bottom of the hill, nearly opposite to its unworthy 
successor, a poor village of the same name ; having 
travelled this day about nine hours." This makes 
the distance from Khan Leban about twenty-seven 
miles, but, allowing for deviations from the direct 
track, twenty-four miles, and sixteen hours, or forty- 
eight miles, from Jerusalem. Josephus, however, 
makes it but one day's journey from the capital.* 
It is six miles beyond Napolose ; and if the distance of 
the latter place is correctly given by our authorities, it 
cannot exceed forty miles. 

Sebaste is the name which Herod gave to the 
ancient Samaria, the imperial city of the ten tribes, 
in honour of Augustus (Sebastos) Caesar, when he 
rebuilt and fortified it, converting the greater part 
of it into a citadel, and erecting here a noble temple, f 
" The situation," says Dr. Richardson, 66 is extremely 
beautiful, J and strong by nature ; more so, I think, 
than Jerusalem. It stands on a fine, large, insulated 

* Joseph. Antiq. book xv. chap. 9. f Ibid. 

| << It is situated upon a long mount, of an oval figure j having 
first a fruitful valley, and then a ring of hills running round 
about it. This great city is now wholly converted into gardens."— 
Maundrell. 



PALESTINE ; 0E ? 



hill, compassed all around by a broad deep valley ; and 
when fortified, as it is stated to have been by Herod, 
one would have imagined that, in the ancient system 
of warfare, nothing but famine could have reduced 
such a place. The valley is surrounded by four hills, 
one on each side, which are cultivated in terraces up 
to the top, sown with grain, and planted with fig and 
olive trees, as is also the valley. The hill of Samaria 
likewise rises in terraces to a height equal to any of 
the adjoining mountains. 

" The present village is small and poor, and after 
passing the valley, the ascent to it is very steep. 
Viewed from the station of our tents, it is extremely 
interesting, both from its natural situation, and from 
the picturesque remains of a ruined convent, of good 
Gothic architecture. 

" Having passed the village, towards the middle of 
the first terrace, there is a number of columns still 
standing. I counted twelve in one row, besides 
several that stood apart, the brotherless remains of 
other rows. The situation is extremely delightful, 
and my guide informed me, that they belonged to the 
serai, or palace. On the next terrace there are no 
remains of solid building, but heaps of stone and lime 
and rubbish mixed with the soil in great profusion. 
Ascending to the third or highest terrace, the traces 
of former building were not so numerous, but we 
enjoyed a delightful view of the surrounding country. 
The eye passed over the deep valley that encompasses 
the hill of Sebaste, and rested on the mountains 
beyond, that retreated as they rose with a gentle 
slope, and met the view in every direction, like a 
book laid out for perusal on a reading-desk. This 
was the seat of the capital of the short-lived and 
wicked kingdom of Israel ; and on the face of these 



THE HOLY LAND. 



259 



mountains the eye surveys the scene of many bloody 
conflicts and many memorable events. Here those 
holy men of God, Elijah and EHsha, spoke their tre- 
mendous warnings in the ears of their incorrigible 
rulers, and wrought their miracles in the sight of all 
the people. 

" From this lofty eminence we descended to the 
south side of the hill, where we saw the remains of 
a stately colonnade that stretches along this beautiful 
exposure from east to west. Sixty columns are still 
standing in one row. The shafts are plain, and frag- 
ments of Ionic volutes, that lie scattered about, testify 
the order to which they belonged. These are probably 
the relics of some of the magnificent structures with 
which Herod the Great adorned Samaria. None of 
the walls remain." 

Mr. Buckingham mentions a current tradition, 
that the avenue of columns formed a part of Herod's 
palace. According to his account, there were eighty- 
three of these columns erect in 1816, besides others 
prostrate ; all without capitals. Josephus states, that, 
about the middle of the city, Herod built " a sacred 
place, of a furlong and a half in circuit, and adorned 
it with all sorts of decorations ; and therein erected a 
temple, illustrious for both its largeness and beauty." 
It is probable that these columns belonged to it. On 
the eastern side of the same summit are the remains, 
Mr. Buckingham states, of another building, " of 
which eight large and eight small columns are still 
standing, with many others fallen near them. These 
also are without capitals, and are of a smaller size and 
of an inferior stone to the others."* u In the walls 

* Maundrell briefly says: ** All the tokens that remain to testify 
that there has ever been such a place, are only, on the north side, 4 



260 PALESTINE; OR, 

of the humble dwellings forming the modern village, 
portions of sculptured blocks of stone are perceived, 
and even fragments of granite pillars have been 
Worked into the masonry." The Gothic convent 
referred to by Dr. Richardson, is the ruined cathe- 
dral, attributed, like every thing else of the kind in 
Palestine, to the Empress Helena. It stands east 
and west, and is about 100 feet in length, by 50 in 
breadth. " On the south side are high, slender but- 
tresses ; and on a piece of building without this, is 
a sloping pyramidal mole, constructed of exceedingly 
large stones. The northern wall is quite plain ; the 
eastern front is semi -circular, with three open and 
two closed windows, each contained in arches divided 
from each other by three Corinthian columns. The 
interior of the eastern front has a pointed arch, and 
columns of no known order; though the capitals 
approach nearer to the Corinthian than any other. 
The eight small arches which go round the tops of 
the widows within, are semi -circular, and have each 
at their spring the capital of a column, but no shaft 
attached to it ; the great arch of the recess is pointed, 
and the moulding that passes round it is fantastic -in 
the extreme. Among other things seen there, are the 
representations of scaly armour, an owl, an eagle, a 
human figure, and an angel, all occupying separate 
compartments, and all distinct from each other. 

" The exterior of the eastern front presents a still 
more singular mixture of style, as the pointed and the 
round arch are both used in the same range, and the 
ornaments of each are varied. In the lower cornice 

large square piazza, encompassed with pillars ; and on the east, 
some poor remains of a great church, said to have been built by 
the Empress Helena, over the place where St. John Baptist was 
both imprisoned and beheaded," 



THE HOLY LAND. 



261 



are human heads, perhaps in allusion to the severed 
head of the Baptist ; and there are here as fantastic 
figures as on the inside, the whole presenting a 
strange assemblage of incongruous ornaments in the 
most wretched taste. 

" The masonry appears in some parts to have been 
exceedingly solid, in others only moderately good, 
and in some places weak and paltry ; and at the west 
end, in a piece of building, apparently added since the 
original construction of the church itself, are seen 
several blocks of sculptured stone, apparently taken 
from the ruins, and worked into the present masonry 
there. 

" On the inside of this ruined edifice is a small 
mosque, erected over the supposed dungeon in which 
St. John was executed ; and an Arab family, who 
claim the guardianship of this sanctuary, have pitched 
their dwelling on the south-west angle of the great- 
church, where it has the appearance of a pigeon-house. 
On learning that I was a Moslem, we were all ad- 
mitted into this mosque, which we entered with be- 
coming reverence. They have collected here the 
white marble slabs, found amid the ruins of the 
church, to form a pavement ; and in one part we 
noticed three large pieces, with sculptured circles and 
bands on them, which were set up in the wall as 
tablets. 

" The mosque itself is a small oblong room, with 
steps ascending to an oratory, and its only furniture 
is a few simple lamps and some clean straw mats for 
prayer, the recess of the Caaba being in the southern 
wall. From the mosque, we descended by a narrow 
flight of steps to the subterranean chamber or dun- 
geon of St. John, which had all the appearance of 
having been an ancient sepulchre. It was not more 

Q2 



262 PALESTINE; OR, 

than ten feet square ; and had niches, as if for the re- 
ception of corpses, in arched recesses on each side. 
There was here, too, one of those remarkable stone 
doors, which seem to have been exclusively appropriated 
to tombs, resembling exactly in form and size those 
described in the Roman sepulchres at Oom Kais. The 
panneling, the lower pivot, and the sill in the ledge 
for receiving the bolt, were all still perfect ; but the 
door was now unhung, and lay on its side against 
the wall." 

In the court at the west end of the church are 
u two apertures leading down to a large subterranean 
reservoir for water, well stuccoed on the inside, and 
during the rains often filled to the brim." 

The modern Sebaste is governed by its own shiekh, 
who is himself a husbandman : the natives pronounce 
the name of the place Subusta. 

The route taken by Dr. Richardson now passes over 
the mountain to the east of Sebaste, and then descends 
to a ruined building called by the natives Beit Emi- 
reen (the house of the two princes), near a village 
of the same name, by a stream of water. u Leaving 
this valley," he continues, 44 we crossed the mountain 
to the left, and after travelling about an hour along 
a very rough and stony ravine, we came to the village 
of Gibba, which is surrounded with olive and pome- 
granate trees, the latter of which were in full blow, 
and occupies a lofty station to overlook a small valley. 
From Gibba, we proceeded along the valley to San- 
nour, which is a fort erected on an insulated moun- 
tain that springs up in the middle of the valley. It is 
commonly called Khallah Giurali, or Fort Jurali, from 
Giurali, (Jerar ?) the name of the chief who commands 
the country. A few miles further on, we came to 
Abata, a pleasant village on our right, and similarly 



THE HOLY LAND. 



263 



situated to Gibba, among olive and pomegranate trees. 
The inhabitants are said to be particularly hospitable 
and kind to strangers. We did not stop to put their 
hospitality to the test, but continued our route along 
the narrow dell, and having crossed another moun- 
tain on the left, opened the beautiful vale of Esdraelon, 
and the town of Jenin, pleasantly situated at the foot 
of the mountain. We descended to a level piece of 
stony ground which bore a tolerably good crop of 
thistles, and pitched our tents on the outside of the 
town, having travelled this day about eight hours and 
a half." 

Sannour, or Sanhoor, called by Dr. Clarke San« 
torri, deserves a more particular notice. He makes 
it three hours, or nine miles, from Jenin. The castle, 
which he describes as very much resembling the eld 
castellated buildings in England, is very strong : it 
held out against Djezzar Pasha, when he held the 
pashalic of Damascus, for two months, and he was 
compelled at last to raise the siege. In the time of 
the Crusades it must have been impregnable. " Yet," 
says Dr. Clarke, " there is no account of it in any 
author ; and certainly it is not of later construction 
than the period of the holy wars." If the learned 
traveller has given the present name correctly, it 
would seem, both from the meaning and the language 
of the word, holy tower, to date from the Crusades. 
But, doubtless, the site is noticed by the older writers, 
under its original name. Their supposed silence, 
however, tempted Dr. Clarke to hazard the strange 
conjecture that it might be the site of Samaria ; for, 
in his gallop through the Holy Land, he forgot to 
visit, or overlooked Sebaste ! The hill commands the 
view to the northward of a fine broad valley, bounded 
by other hills on every side, about two miles in breadth 



264 



PALESTINE; OR, 



and five in length : the valley southward is narrower, 
and both are cultivated. . The ascent is steep on all 
sides. The walls of the town are strongly built, " ap- 
parently," says Mr. Buckingham, " of old Saracenic 
work," and in circuit less than half a mile, with two 
gates in opposite quarters. The houses are well built, 
but the streets are narrow ; the inhabitants all 31a- 
hommedans. The governor (then Hadje Ahmed 
Jerar) is tributary to Damascus, but absolute within 
his own territory, which includes several towns and 
villages, with extensive lands around them, of which 
he is as it were the feudal lord. Hadje Ahmed is 
described as of a most amiable and patriarchal cha- 
racter ; and the aspect of the country bore the most 
pleasing marks of the benign influence of his mild and 
paternal government. 

Jennin, or Genin, (pronounced Djenneen,) the an- 
cient Ginaia, or Ginaea, and supposed to be the Geman 
of Josephus, was the frontier town of Samaria on the 
border of Galilee ; being situated at the entrance of 
the great plain. It is mentioned by Josephus as the 
scene of a battle between the Galileans, who were 
going up to Jerusalem to the feast of tabernacles, and 
the natives.*. . It is now a mere village, containing 
about 800 inhabitants ; but there are evidences of its 
having once been of much greater extent. There are 
the remains of a Christian convent on the outside of 
the walls, now partly occupied by a Turkish cemetery. 
Within the town, Dr. Clarke observed the ruins of a 
palace and a mosque, with marble pillars, fountains, 
and even piazzas, some in a very perfect state. An 
Arabic inscription over one of these buildings, purports 

* Joseph. Wars, book ii. chap. 12. See also Antiq. book xx. 

chap. 6. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



265 



that it was erected by an individual of the name of 
Selim. As a fence to the gardens, Dr. Clarke noticed 
the cactus ficus Indicus, growing to so enormous a 
size, that the stem was larger than a man's body ; and 
its gaudy blossoms made a most splendid show in the 
midst of its bristly spines. 

The route from Jennin to Nazareth lies directly 
across the plain of Esdraelon, a distance of seven 
hours, or twenty-one miles. Nearly in the middle 
of the plain is the line of separation between the 
pashalics of Acre and of Damascus. The road to 
Tiberias, which we are now to follow, proceeds east- 
ward along this beautiful vale ; watered, in this part, 
by a fertilizing stream, which, says Dr. Richardson, 
u we crossed and re- crossed several times in our 
march. In four hours after leaving Jennin, we came 
to the source, where it issues in a large current from 
the rock, and is called El Geleed, or the cold. In two 
hours more we came to Bisan. The delightful vale 
of Esdraelon is but thinly inhabited, and not half 
cultivated or stocked with cattle. We did not pass 
a single village, and saw but few Bedoween encamp- 
ments till we came near to Bisan. As we approached 
this miserable village, we gradually withdrew from 
the vale, and got upon an elevated rocky flat, covered 
with a thin and meagre sprinkling of earth ; the vege- 
tation which it bore was scanty, and quite brown 
from the lack of moisture. The valley of the Jordan 
began to open on our view, and, before we came up to 
the village, we passed the remains of a Roman fortress 
and a Roman theatre, with many vaults * and columns, 
on the left of our route. The village itself is a col- 
lection of the most miserable hovels, containing about 



* Supposed to be the ruins of subterranean granaries. 



PALESTINE ; OR, 



200 inhabitants ; and, on looking at their wretched 
accommodation, and comparing it with a Bedoween 
encampment that was spread out at a little distance 
in the valley, we were not surprised to hear that, 
in these countries, the dwellers in tents look on the 
dwellers in towns as an inferior class of beings." 

The young emir, or chief of the Arabs of Bisan, 
who waited on Lord Belmore, arrayed in his black 
abba and yellow boots, is described as a mild-tempered, 
intelligent youth ; but the rest of the inhabitants had 
the most ruffian-like and depraved appearance. 

Bisan, the Bethsan or Bethshan of Scripture, * is 
the Scythopolis of the Greek and Roman writers. It 
was the largest city of the Decapolis, and the only 
one on that side of the Jordan. The theatre is quite 
distinct, and measures about 180 feet in length ; it is 
completely filled with weeds. In one of the most con- 
cealed vomitories, Captain Mangles states, that they 
found twenty-four human skulls, with other bones. 
A viper was basking in one of the skulls, with his 
body twisted between the eyes, — " a good subject for 
a moralizer." In some of the tombs which lie to the 
N.E. of the acropolis, without the walls, there re- 
mained sarcophagi ; and, in a few instances, the doors 
were still hanging on their ancient hinges of stone ; 
they observed also niches of a triangular shape for 
lamps. Two streams run through the ruins of the 
city, almost insulating the acropolis : over the one to 
the S.W. is a fine Roman bridge, beyond which may 
be seen the paved way which led to the ancient 
Ptolemais (Acre). These streams afterwards unite, 

* Josh. xvii. 11 ; 1 Sam. xxxi. 12; 1 Kings iv. 12. It was one 
of the towns which Manasseh had in Issachar. To the wall of 
Bethsan the Philistines fastened the bodies of Saul and his three 
eons, after they had fallen in Mount Gilboa. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



267 



and are crossed by another bridge, having one high 
arch in the centre, and two smaller ones, which have 
been walled up ; along the outer edge of this bridge, 
the wall of the city was continued ; and on the hill, 
near the arch, the ruins of one of the gates of the city 
are distinguishable ; there are some prostrate columns 
of the Corinthian order. The acropolis is a high 
circular hill, on the top of which are the traces of the 
ancient walls of the fortress.* Dr. Richardson noticed 
masses of ejected lava scattered round the village ; and 
the mountains, he says, have the appearance of extinct 
volcanoes. 

Pursuing the route to Tiberias, up the delightful 
plain of the Jordan, the traveller has on his left 
Mount Gilboa, which comes close to Bisan, and bounds 
the plain on the west. The natives still call it Djebel 
Gilbo. It is a lengthened ridge, rising up in peaks, 
about 800 feet above the level of the road, and pro- 
bably 1000 feet above the level of the Jordan. On 
the east, the plain is bounded by a high mountain 
range, which forms part of Mount Gilead, so that the 
view on both sides is extremely interesting ; and at 
the time of Dr. Richardson's journey (May), rich crops 
of barley, apparently over-ripe, added to the beauty of 
the landscape. After riding for nearly three hours, 
the route led them to the banks of the Jordan, where 
it is crossed by a large stone bridge, consisting of one 
large and two smaller arches. Here a large khan has 
been built for the accommodation of travellers who 
take the road to Damascus through the Decapolis and 
Mount Gilead. The river at this point is of a con. 
siderable depth, and between thirty and forty feel 
wide ; the channel very stony, and the waters of a 



* Irby and Mangles, pp. 302, 303. 



268 



PALESTINE; OR, 



'* white sulphureous colour," but free from any un- 
pleasant smell or taste. Near Bisan, its width is one 
hundred and forty feet, and the current is much more 
rapid. Beyond the bridge, the plain of the Jordan 
narrows into a valley, and the river remains in sight 
till the traveller arrives at the shores of the Lake of 
Tiberias : a distance of about eight hours, or twenty- 
four miles from Bisan.* 

Tiberias, still called by the natives Tabaria, or 
Tabbareeah, was anciently one of the principal towns 
of Galilee. It was built by Herod the Tetrarch, and 
named by him in honour of Tiberias the Roman 
emperor, with whom he was a great favourite. -f Very 
considerable privileges were granted to those who 
chose to settle there, in order to overcome the pre- 
judice arising from the city's having been built on 
a site full of ancient sepulchres ; from which circum- 
stance we may infer the existence of a former city 

* The river Jordan, on issuing from the Sea of Galilee, flows 
for about three hours near the western hills: it then turns to- 
wards the eastern, on which Fide it continues its course for several 
hours, till, at Korn-el-Hemar, it returns to the western side. 
Burckhardt gives the following list of the torrents or rivulets 
which descend from the mountains on either side, leaving in 
summer numerous pools of stagnant water. From the western 
mountains, beginning at the southern extremity of the Lake of 
Tiberias, Wady Fedjaz, Ain-el-Szammera, Wady Djaloud, Wady- 
el-Byre, and Wady-el-Oeshe ; all to the north of Bisan. Below 
it, Wady-el-Maleh, Wady Medjedda (with a ruined town so called), 
Wady-el-Beydham (coming from the neighbourhood of Nablous), 
and Wady-el-Farah. From the eastern mountains, Sheriat-el- 
Mandhour, Wady-el-Arab, Wady-el-Koszeir, Wady-el-Taybe, and 
Wady-el-Seklab (near the village Erbayn) ; all to the north of the 
foid near Bisan. Beyond it, Wady Mous, Wady Yabes, Wady 
Amata, aad Wady Zerka, which divide the district of Moerad 
from El Belka. 

\ Joseph. Antiq. lib. xviii. cap. 3 ; De Bell. lib. ii. cap. 8. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



269 



in the vicinity : this is supposed to have been the 
ancient Cinneroth or Kinnereth. Here, during a 
visit paid to the city by Herod Agrippa, the kings of 
Comagene, of Emessa, of the Lesser Armenia, of 
Pontus, and of Chalcis, met to do him honour, and 
were magnificently entertained.* After the downfall 
of Jerusalem, it continued to be, until the fifth century, 
the residence of Jewish rabbies and learned men ; and 
was the seat of' a patriarch, who acted as the supreme 
judge between persons of his own nation. The office 
was hereditary, and was supported with some lustre, 
under the Emperor Hadrian, in the person of Selim 
III. ; but, in the year 429, it was suppressed, after 
subsisting 350 years, under nine or ten patriarchs. 
In the sixth century, according to Procopius, Justi- 
nian rebuilt the walls. In the seventh, A.D. G40, 
during the reign of the Emperor Heraclius, the city 
was taken by the Saracens under Caliph Omar. -|- 
Yet, in the eighth, it is mentioned in an Itinerary 
cited by Reland, as still containing many churches 
and Jewish synagogues. Pococke, without citing his 
authority, says, that the Jewish rabbins lived here till 
the eleventh century, but that the Jews had left the 
place above eight hundred years. It seems doubtful, 
however, whether it has ever been wholly deserted 
by them. Tiberias was an ancient seat of Jewish 
literature. A university was founded here by the 
patriarch, after the fall of Jerusalem ; and it is re- 
markable, that there is a college of Jews in Tabaria at 
the present time : it would be very interesting to 
ascertain the date of its establishment. Dr. Richard- 
son found six rabbies engaged in studying Hebrew 

* Joseph. Antiq. lib. xix. cap. 7« 

t Basnage's History of the Jews, cited by Van Egmont, vol. ih 
p. 30, Clarke's Travels, vol. iv, p. 222. 



270 



PALESTINE; OR, 



folios. " They occupied two large rooms, which were 
surrounded with books, and said they spent their 
time entirely in studying the Scriptures and com- 
mentaries thereon. I regretted much," adds Dr. R., 
" that I had not been apprised of this institution at 
an earlier part of the day. Not having an interpreter 
with me, I could not turn my short interview to the 
same advantage that I should otherwise have done." 

The modern town of Tabaria is situated close to 
the edge of the lake. It has tolerably high but ill- 
built walls on three of its sides, flanked with circular 
towers ; on the fourth, it is open to the water. Its 
figure is nearly quadrangular ; * according to Pococke, 
it is about a quarter of a mile in length, and half that 
in breadth ; in circumference, therefore, about three 
quarters of a mile. Like all Turkish citadels, it has 
an imposing appearance from without ; and its fortifi- 
cations and circular towers give it more the aspect of 
a Moorish city than most of the towns in Palestine. 
But it exhibits the utmost wretchedness within the 
walls, one-fourth of the space being wholly unoc- 
cupied, and the few houses or huts which it contains 
are not built contiguously. The sheikh's house is 
described by Van Egmont as tolerably good, and 
indeed the only building that deserves the name ; 
and even this owes its beauty to the ruins out of 
which it is built. Adjoining to it is a large hand- 
some structure, which serves as a stable. Near the 
sheikh's house are the ruins of a very large castle, 
with some remains of towers, moats, and other works, 

* Mr. Buckingham says, H in the form of an irregular crescent." 
" The southern wall approaches close to the beach ; but the north- 
western angle of the northern wall, being seated on a rising ground, 
recedes some little distance from the water, and gives an irregular 
form to the enclosure." 



THE HOLY LAND. 



271 



which probably commanded the harbour. One of 
these works, facing the lake, has been turned into a 
mosque. On the rising ground to the northward of 
the ruin, stands the modern castle, which dates only a 
few years before the period of Pococke's visit. Has- 
selquist informs us, that it owes its erection to Sheikh 
Daker, a native of Tiberias, and at that time inde- 
pendent lord of the place, which he had recently 
defended against the Pasha of Seide. " He had no 
more than six small iron cannon in this work of 
defence ; but he used another method, still more an- 
cient than cannons, for defending forts. He ordered 
loose stones to be laid on the top of the wall, four feet 
high, Avhich, in case of a siege, might be rolled down, 
and crush the besiegers." The marks of the siege 
were then to be seen on the walls. Pococke, who 
preceded Hasselquist about thirteen years, was at 
Tiberias when the fort was building, and they were 
strengthening the old walls with buttresses on the 
inside, the sheikh then having a dispute with the 
Pasha of Damascus. " They have often," he adds. 
* 4 had disputes with the pashas of Damascus, who 
have come and planted their cannon against the city, 
and sometimes have beaten down part of the walls, 
but were never able to take it." The town has only 
two gates ; one near the sheikh's house, facing the 
sea ; the other, which was very large, is partly walled 
up, the city on that side being uninhabited.* The 
houses are described by Van Egmont as w very mean 

* f« There are two gates visible from without, one near the 
southern, and the other in the western wall ; the latter, which 
is in one of the round towers, is the only one now open : there 
are appearances also of the town having been surrounded with a 
ditch, but this is now filled up with cultivable soil." — Buck- 
ingham* 



272 



PALESTINE; on, 



and low cottages, some of stone, and others of dried 
mud, and can hardly be said to be above the ground. 
On the terraces, which even the huts in this country 
are not without, they build tents of rushes." Mr. 
Buckingham states, that there are two synagogues 
near the centre of the town, both of them inferior 
to that of Jerusalem, though similar in design ; and, 
on the rising ground near the northern quarter, a 
small, but good bazar, and two or three coffee-sheds. 

The only interesting relic of antiquity in the town, 
is the church dedicated to St. Peter; an oblong square 
edifice, arched over, said to be on the spot where 
the house of St. Peter was, though St. Peter lived at 
Capernaum.* It stands at the north-east corner of 
the town, close to the water's edge, and is described 
by Mr. Buckingham as a vaulted room, about thirty 
feet by fifteen, and perhaps fifteeen feet in height : 
over the door is one small window, and on each side 
four others, all arched and open.*}- Van Egmont says, 

* In justice to the original inventor of the legend, it should be 
mentioned, that this is a modem blunder of the monks. Boni- 
facius states, that the building erected by Helena marked the spot 
where our Lord appeared to Peter, after his resurrection ; as re- 
corded John xxi. 1. 

t This seems to be the ancient church described by Dr. Clarke > 
to which, he says, " we descended by steps, as into the church 
of St. Sophia at Constantinople, and some other early Christian 
sanctuaries, where the entrance resembles that of a cellar, daylight 
being rarely admitted. There is reason to believe," he adds, 
" that this was the first place of Christian worship erected in 
Tiberias, and that it was constructed as early as the fourth cen- 
tury. The roof is of stone, and it is vaulted. We could discover 

no inscription, nor any other clue to its origin Its arched 

stone roof, yet existing entire, renders it worthy of more particular 
attention." — Vol. iv. p. 215. Captain Mangles controverts the 
opinion of its remote antiquity ; stating, that after they had been 
there a few days, they observed on one of the stones of the building, 
part of an inverted Arabic inscription, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



273 



that it is used at present as a stable ; and they accord- 
ingly put up their horses there. The ancient town 
extended about half a mile further to the south than 
the present walls, as is indicated by a great number 
of confused ruins ; and Pococke observed, that the 
suburbs extended still further in the same direction. 
Near the present town, he says, there are ruins of 
another church ; and further on. some signs of a 
large square building, about which lie several pillars, 
which might be the house of the government. Captain 
Mangles states, that u at the northern extremity of 
the ruins are the remains of the ancient town, which 
are discernible by means of the walls and other ruined 
buildings, as well as by fragments of columns, some 
of which are of beautiful red granite." This agrees 
with Van Egmont's representation, that the old city 
began at some distance to the north of the present 
town, extending along the side of the lake beyond the 
Baths of Emmaus, which are about a mile from the 
modern town, to the south of it. " In our way 
thither," says the last-mentioned traveller, " we 
plainly saw the foundations of the old city, and the 
remains of bulwarks erected on frustums of pillars. 
In short, the whole road to the bath, and even 
some distance beyond it, was full of ruins of walls ; 
and near it we saw the ruins of a gate." These walls 
were continued to the mountains which confined the 
city towards the west, so that its breadth could not 
exceed half a mile. The wall beyond the baths, which 
runs from the lake to the mountain's side, is, however, 
supposed by Mr. Bankes to be rather the fortification 
of Vespasian's camp. Pococke places the baths a 
quarter of a mile south of the walls of old Tiberias. 
The ancient name of Emmaus, which signifies baths, 
is still preserved in the Arabic Hamam^ by which the 



274 PALESTINE; OE, 

place is now called. The waters are much resorted to, 
being esteemed good for all sorts of pains and tumours, 
and even for the gout. Dr. Richardson found the 
Pasha of Acre encamped here, with a numerous 
retinue ; having been advised to use the baths, by 
his medical attendant, who was a Frank. At a little 
distance from him, Lady Hester Stanhope had taken 
up her residence in a mosque. " Not having any 
thermometer," says Dr. R., 44 I could not ascertain 
the temperature of the spring ; but it is so hot, that 
the hand could not endure it ; and the water must- 
remain twelve hours in the bath, before it can be 
used ; and then I should consider it as above 100°. 
It contains a strong solution of common salt, with a 
considerable intermixture of iron and sulphur. ,, Po- 
cocke, who brought away a bottle of the waters, says, 
that they were found to hold a considerable quantity 
of 44 gross fixed vitriol, some alum, and a mineral salt." 
He observed a red sediment upon the stones. Van 
Egmont and Heyman state, that they resemble in 
quality those of Aix la Chapelle. 68 Our curiosity," 
they say, w led us to go into the bath, the water of 
which was so hot as not easily to be endured ; but, 
to render it more temperate, we ordered the passage 
through which it runs into the basin, to be stopped. 
The inhabitants of Tiberias have built here a small 
house with a cupola ; but there seems to have been 
formerly a much more splendid edifice, as the baths 
were very famous. The water rises something higher, 
whence it is conducted into a stone basin. This water 
is so salt as to communicate a brackish taste to that of 
the lake near it." Hasselquist has given a still more 
minute account, which Dr. Clarke has evidently over- 
looked in referring to him. u The fountain or 
source," he says, 44 is at the foot of a mountain, at the 



THE HOLY LAND. 



275 



distance of a pistol-shot from the Lake Gennesareth, 
and a quarter of a league from the coasts of Tiberias. 
The mountain consists of a black and brittle sulphu-i 
reous stone, which is only to be found in large masses 
in the neighbourhood of Tiberias, but in loose stones 
also on the coast of the Dead Sea, as well as here. 
They cut millstones out of it in this place, which are 
sent by water from Acre to Egypt. I saw an incre- 
dible quantity of them at Damietta. The spring 
which comes from the mountain is in diameter equal 
to that of a man's arm, and there is one only. The 
water is so hot, that the hand may be put into it 
without scalding, but it cannot be kept there long ; 
consequently, it is not boiling hot, but the next degree 
to it. It has a strong sulphureous smell. It tastes 
bitter, and something like common salt. The sedi- 
ment deposited by it is black, as thick as paste, smells 
strongly of sulphur, and is covered with two skins, 
or cuticles, of which that beneath is of a fine dark- 
green colour, and the uppermost of a light rusty 
colour. At the mouth of the outlet, where the water 
formed little cascades over the stones, the first-men- 
tioned cuticle alone was found, and so much resembled 
a conferva, that one might easily have taken this, 
that belongs to the mineral kingdom, for a vegetable 
production ; but, nearer the river, where the water 
stood still, one might see both skins, the yellow upper- 
most, and under it the green." At that time (1750), 
the waters appear to have been neglected, and the 
" miserable bathing house" was not kept in repair.* 

It seems at first difficult to account for the state- 
ment given by this usually correct writer, that there 
is but one spring, when Captain Mangles states that 



* Voyages and Travels, p. 283. 



276 PALESTINE; OR, 

there are three ; but Mr. Buckingham's minute and 
lively description explains the apparent discrepancy. 

w Leaving the town at the western gate, we pur- 
sued our Course southerly along its wall, and came to 
some scattered ruins of the old city of Tiberias ; among 
which we observed many foundations of buildings, some 
fragments of others still standing, and both grey and 
red granite columns, some portions of the latter being 
at least four feet in diameter ; but among the whole, 
we saw neither ornamented capitals nor sculptured 
stones of any kind, though the city is known to have 
been a considerable one. 

" In our way, we passed an old tree standing amid 
these ruins, and observed its branches to be hung with 
rags of every hue and colour, no doubt the offerings of 
those who either expected or had received benefit 
from the springs in the road to which it lay. Through- 
out the cliffs of the overhanging mountain on the 
west, are rude grottoes at different heights ; and oppo- 
site to the tree are two arched caves, one of them 
having a square door of entrance beneath the arch, 
and both of them being apparently executed with 
care. We had not time to examine them, though we 
conceived them to have been most probably ancient 
sepulchres. 

" In less than an hour after our leaving the town, 
we arrived at the baths. The present building, erected 
over the springs here, is small and mean, and is alto- 
gether the work of Mahommedans. It is within a 
few yards of the edge of the lake, and contains a bath 
for males and a bath for females, each with their sepa- 
rate apartment annexed. Over the door of the former 
is an Arabic inscription ; ascending to this door by 
a few steps, it leads to an outer room, with an open 
window, a hearth for preparing coffee, and a small 



THE UOLY LAND. 



closet for the use of the attendant. Within this is 
the bath itself, a square room of about eighteen or 
twenty feet, covered with a low dome, and having 
benches in recesses on each side. The cistern for 
containing the hot water is in the centre of this room, 
and is sunk below the pavement ; it is a square of 
eight or nine feet only, and the spring rises to supply 
it through a small head of some animal ; but this is so 
badly executed, that it is difficult to decide for what it 
was intended. My thermometer rose here instantly to 
130°, which was its utmost limit ; but the heat of the 
water was certainly greater. It was painful to the 
hand as it issued from the spout, and could only be 
borne gradually by those who bathed in the cistern. 

" There is here only an old man and a little boy to 
hold the horses, and make coffee for the visitors ; and 
those who bathe, strip in the inner room, and wash 
themselves in the cistern, without being furnished 
with cloths, carpets, cushions, or any of the usual 
comforts of a Turkish bath. The whole establish- 
ment, indeed, is of the poorest kind, and tlpe sight of 
the interior is rather disgusting than inviting. 

" At this bath we met with a soldier whom they 
called Mahommed Mamlouk, and I learnt that he 
was a German by birth, having become a Mamlouk 
and Mahommedan when a boy. He was now the 
hasnadar or treasurer to the Agha of Tabareeah, and 
was so completely a Turk as to profess, that he would 
not willingly return to his native country, even if he 
could do so under the most favourable circumstances. 
He spoke the Turkish and Arabic languages equally 
well ; and it was in the latter that we conversed, as 
he had entirely forgotten his native tongue, though 
not more than thirty-five years of age. 

PART II, R 



v 



278 



PALESTINE; ORj 



" Besides the spring which supplies the present 
baths, there are several others near it, all rising close 
to the edge of the lake, and all equally hot, finely 
transparent, and slightly sulphureous, resembling ex- 
actly the spring at El-Hame. There are also extensive 
ruins around, which are most probably the remains of 
Roman edifices ; though that which has been taken for 
the remains of a theatre, appears rather to have been 
the choir of an early Christian church. Among them 
all, there is nothing, however, either interesting or 
definite. We quitted this spot to return to the town, 
and in our way by the bath, saw a party of Jewish 
women just coming out from the female apartment. 
Their conversation was in German ; and, on inquiry, 
they said that they had come from Vienna with their 
husbands, to end their days in the land of their fathers. 
In our way back from hence, we were met by a party 
of Moslems, who conceiving me, from my dress and 
white turban, to be of their faith, gave us the usual 
salute, which I returned without scruple ; but our 
guide was so shocked at the interchange of forbidden 
salutations between a Christian and a Mohammedan, 
that he expressed his confidence in its ending in some 
unlucky accident to us. To avert this, however, from 
his own head, he took a large stone from the road, 
and after spitting on it, turned that part towards the 
north, repeating a short Arabic prayer at the same 
time. Besides the present incident, I had observed on 
several other occasions, that, in this country, set forms 
of expressions are regarded as appropriate to men of 
different faiths, and even different ranks in life ; and 
that therefore nothing is more necessary for a tra- 
veller, than to acquaint himself with those minute 
shades of difference; as they serve, like the watch* 



THE HOLY LAtfD, 



word of an army, to distinguish friends from foes ; and 
any errors therein might produce the most alarming 
consequences. 

" On our way we met a Jewish funeral, attended 
by a party of about fifty persons, all male. A groupe 
of half a dozen walked before, but without any appa- 
rent regard to order, and all seemed engaged in hum- 
niing indistinctly hymns, or prayers, or lamentations % 
for they might have been either, as far as we could 
distinguish by the tone and the manner of their 
utterance. The corpse followed, wrapped in linen, 
without a coffin, and slung on cords between two poles 
borne on men's shoulders, with its feet foremost. A 
funeral service was said over it at the grave, and it 
was sunk into its mother earth in peace." 

This traveller notices some ancient baths, to the 
north of Tiberias also, which appear to have escaped 
the observation of preceding travellers. About an 
hour from Tiberias, pursuing a northward course 
along the border of the lake, he came to the remains 
of three, close to the water's edge, which he describes 
as so many large circular cisterns, quite open, and not 
appearing to have ever been inclosed in a covered 
building. u They were all," he continues, u nearly 
of the same size ; the one around the edge of which I 
walked, being eighty paces in circumference, and from 
twelve to fifteen feet deep. Each of these was distant 
from the other about one hundred yards, ranging 
along the beach of the lake, and each was supplied by 
a separate spring, rising also near the sea. The 
water was in all of them beautifully transparent, of a 
slightly sulphureous taste, and of a light-green colour, 
as at the bath near Oom Kais ; but the heat of the 
stream here was scarcely greater than that of the 
atmosphere, as the thermometer in the air stood at 



280 



PALESTINE; OR, 



84°, and when immersed in water, rose to 86°. The 
first of these circular cisterns had a stone bench or 
pathway running round its interior, for the accommo- 
dation of the bathers, and the last had a similar work 
on the outside ; in the latter, a number of small black 
fish were seen swimming. Each of the baths were 
supplied by a small aqueduct from its separate spring ; 
and there were appearances of a semi-circular wall 
having inclosed them all within one area. 

Mr. Jolliffe reports the estimated number of inha- 
bitants to be 4000, two-thirds of which are Jews. 
Burckhardt's account agrees with this as to numbers ; 
but he makes the proportion of Jews only one-fourth.* 
There are, he says, from one hundred and sixty to 
two hundred Jewish families, of which forty or fifty 
are of Polish origin ; the rest are J ews from Spain, 
Barbary, and different parts of Syria. The quarter 
which they occupy in the middle of the town, had 
lately been much enlarged by the purchase of several 
streets, so that their numbers appear to be on the 
increase. Tiberias holds out to the Jews peculiar 
advantages. They enjoy here perfect religious free- 
dom ; besides which, Tiberias is one of the four holy 
cities of the Talmud, the other three being Saphet, 
Jerusalem, and Hebron. " It is esteemed holy ground," 
Burckhardt states, " because Jacob is supposed to 
have resided here,-]- and because it is situated on the 
Lake of Grennesareth ; from which, according to the 

* Mr. Buckingham says, that, according to the opinion of the 
best-informed residents, the population does not exceed 2000 souls, 
of whom about half are Jews. 

t Perhaps not the patriarch, but some great rabbin of that 
name. Burckhardt speaks of a great rabbin, who, he was in- 
formed, lies buried at Tiberias, with 14,000 of his scholars round 
him! 



THE HOLY LAND. 



281 



most generally received opinion of the Talmud, the 
Messiah is to rise. It is a received dogma, that the 
world will return to its primitive chaos, if prayers are 
not addressed to the God of Israel, at least twice a 
week in the four holy cities. On this account, Jewish 
devotees from all parts flock to these cities ; and three 
or four missionaries are sent abroad every year, to 
collect alms for the support of these religious fraterni- 
ties, who do not fail successfully to plead this immi- 
nent danger as an argument for liberal contributions. 
One missionary is sent to the coasts of Africa from 
Damietta to Mogadore ; another to the coasts of 
Europe from Venice to Gibraltar ; a third to the 
Archipelago, Constantinople, and Anatolia ; and a 
fourth through Syria. The charity of the Jews of 
London is appealed to from time to time ; but the 
Jews of Gibraltar have the reputation of being more 
liberal than any others, and are stated to contribute 
from 4 to 5000 Spanish dollars annually. The Polish 
Jews settled at Tabaria, are supported almost entirely 
by their rich countrymen in Bohemia and Poland ; 
and the Syrian Jews are said to be very jealous of 
them. When a fresh pilgrim arrives, bringing a 
little money with him, the exorbitant demands which 
are made on him by his brethren, either for rent, or 
on some other pretence, soon deprive him of it, and 
leave him a pensioner on his nation. The missionaries 
generally realize some property, as they are allowed 
ten per cent, upon the alms they collect. But many 
of the Jews, who have been led to beg their way 
to Palestine by their delusive representations, are ill 
satisfied with the Land of Promise ; and some few are 
fortunate enough to find their way home again. The 
greater number, however, console themselves with the 

R 2 



282 



PALESTINE; OR, 



inestimable advantage of laying their bones in the 
Holy Land. 

The Jewish devotees pass the whole day in the 
schools or the synagogue, reciting the Old Testament 
and the Talmud, both of which many of them know 
entirely by heart. They all write Hebrew ; but their 
learning, Burckhardt says, seems to be on a level with 
that of the Turks. He mentions some beautiful copies 
of the Pentateuch, written on a roll of leather, which 
he saw in the Syrian synagogue : no one could inform 
him of their age or history. The libraries of the two 
schools are moderately stocked with Hebrew books, 
printed chiefly at Vienna and Venice. They observe 
here, he says, a singular custom in the public service. 
" While the rabbin recites the psalms of David, or the 
prayers extracted from them, the congregation fre- 
quently imitate, by their voice or gesture, the meaning 
of some remarkable passages : for example, when the 
rabbin pronounces the words, 6 Praise the Lord with 
the sound of the trumpet,' they imitate the sound of 
the trumpet through their closed fists. When * a 
horrible tempest 1 occurs, they puff and blow to repre- 
sent a storm ; or should he mention the cries of the 
righteous in distress, they all set up a loud scream- 
ing." And sometimes, we are told, these imitative 
accompaniments are carried on in a singular sort of 
fugue or concert ; while some are blowing the storm, 
others having already begun the cries of the righ- 
teous ! 

The Jews marry at a very early age. It is not 
uncommon, Burckhardt affirms, to see fathers of 
thirteen years of age, and mothers of eleven. On the 
occasion of a wedding, they traverse the town in 
pompous procession, carrying before the bride the plate 



THE HOLY LAND, 



283 



of almost the whole community ; and they feast in 
the house of the bridegroom for seven successive days 
and nights. u The wedding-feast of a man who has 
about 50/. a-year, (and no Jew can live with his 
family on less,) will often cost more than 60/." Yet, 
few of them are rich, or carry on any merchandize. 
When Burckhardt was at Tiberias, there were only 
two Jew merchants resident there, who were men of 
property ; and they were styled by the devotees, kafers y 
or unbelievers. The Habbin of Tiberias is under the 
great Rabbin of Szaffad (Saphet), who pronounces 
final judgement onfall contested points of law and 
religion. 

The Christian community consists only of a few 
families, — Mr. Buckingham says, about twenty, of the 
Catholic communion.* They enjoy great liberty, and 
are on a footing of equality with the Turks. The 
difference of treatment which the Christians expe- 
rience from the Turks, in different parts of Syria, is 
very remarkable. It depends very much on the 
character of the local government. At the time of 
Burckhardt's visit, Tabaria, which, with its district of 
ten or twelve villages, forms part of the pashalik of 
Acre, was under the mild and tolerant government of 
Soleiman Pasha, the successor of Djezzar. M At 
Szaffad," says that enterprising traveller, u where is 
a small Christian community, the Turks are extremely 
intolerant : at Tiberias, on the contrary, I have seen 
Christians beating Turks in the public bazar." A 
bazar had been lately built, in which he counted a 
dozen retail shops. u The traffic of the inhabitants is 
principally with the Bedouins of the Ghor and of the 

* Yet Dr. Clarke says, they are numerous, and that he was con- 
vinced of this by the multitude he saw coming from the morning 
service of the church. 



284 



PALESTINE; OR, 



district of Szaffad. The shopkeepers repair every 
Monday to the khan at the foot of Mount Tabor, 
where a market called Souk-el- Khan is held, and 
where the merchandize of the town is bartered, chiefly 
for cattle. The greater part of the inhabitants culti- 
vate the soil, which produces wheat, barley, dhourra, 
tobacco, melons, grapes, and a few vegetables. About 
350 lbs. of melons sell for about eight shillings. The 
heat of the climate would enable them to grow almost 
any tropical plant." There is, however, " little art at 
Tiberias, and less industry." " I had broken," says 
Dr. Richardson, " the niouth-ptece of my pipe at 
Bisan, and could not find in all Tiberias a person who 
could make a tube for it ; yet every person here, both 
men and women, smoke. There are many Turks, 
and a still greater number of Jews, in Tiberias. A 
respectable-looking, rich Jew passes himself off as 
European consul ; though by whom constituted, or 
for what purpose, I cannot say. However, he thought 
proper to pay his respects to the Pasha, dressed in the 
European costume : he wore a scarlet coat and cocked 
hat, tight small-clothes, silk stockings, shoes and 
buckles ; he rode upon an ass, and carried a cochlico 
umbrella above his head. He was a thin, meagre, 
old man, between seventy and eighty years of age. 
His appearance was highly grotesque and abundantly 
amusing to all the spectators." 

It is remarkable, that there are no fishing-boats at 
Tiberias. The fish are caught with casting-nets, 
thrown from the rocks or from the beach ; a method 
which must obviously yield a very small quantity, 
compared to what could be obtained by boats. The 
consequence is, that fish is sold at the same price per 
pound as meat. Pococke went on the lake in a boat 
which was kept in order to fetch wood from the other 



THE HOLY LAttD. 



285 



side. But. when Captain Irby and his companions 
were at Tiberias, not a single boat of any description 
was to be seen on the lake. M The fishery," Burck- 
hardt says, H is rented at seven hundred piastres per 
annum ; but the only boat that was employed on it by 
the fishermen, fell to pieces last year (1811), and such 
is the indolence of these people, that they have not 
yet supplied its loss." The northern part of the lake, 
he says, is full of fish, but he did not see one at the 
southern extremity. The most common species are 
the binni, or carp, and the mesht, a flat fish about a 
foot long and five inches broad. Their flavour is 
reported to be excellent, and the commonest sort is 
the best. Captain Mangles describes it as a species of 
bream, equal to the finest perch. According to Has- 
selquist, the same kind is met with here as in the 
Nile : he specifies charmnth, silurus^ bcenni, mulsil, 
and spar us Galilasus. Some are very large, living 
here in quiet security, being never disturbed by boats 
or vessels, nets or hooks. 



LAKE OF TIBERIAS. 

This inland sea, or more properly lake, which 
derives its several names, the Lake of Tiberias, the 
Sea of Galilee, and the Lake of Gennesareth, from the 
territory which forms its western and south-western 
border, is computed to be between seventeen and 
eighteen miles in length, and from five to six in 
breadth.* The mountains on the east come close to 

* According to Josephus. Dr. Richardson, misled by Sandys, 
makes it " about twelve miles long and six broad." Dr. Clarke 
says : " Of its length we could not form any accurate opinion, 
because its southern extremity, winding behind distant moun- 
tains, was concealed from our view ; but we inclined rather to 



286 



PALESTINE; OR, 



its shore, and the country on that side has not a very 
agreeable aspect : on the west, it has the plain of 
Tiberias, the high ground of the plain Of Hutin, or 
Hottein, the plain of Gennesareth, and the foot of 
those hills by which you ascend to the high moun- 
tain of Saphet. To the north and south it has a plain 
country, or valley. There is a current throughout 
the whole breadth of the lake, even to the shore ; 
and the passage of the Jordan through it is discernible 
by the smoothness of the surface in that part. Various 
travellers have given a very different account of its 
general aspect. According to Captain Mangles, the 
land about it has no striking features, and the scenery 
is altogether devoid of character. " It appeared," 
he says, " to particular disadvantage to us after those 
beautiful lakes we had seen in Switzerland ; but it 
becomes a very interesting object, when you consider 
the frequent allusions to it in the Gospel narrative." 
Dr. Clarke, on the contrary, speaks of the uncommon 
grandeur of this memorable scenery. " The Lake of 
Gennesareth," he says, " is surrounded by objects 
well calculated to heighten the solemn impression " 
made by such recollections, and " affords one of the 
most striking prospects in the Holy Land. Speaking 
of it comparatively, it may be described as longer and 
finer than any of our Cumberland and Westmoreland 
lakes, although perhaps inferior to Loch Lomond. It 
does not possess the vastness of the Lake of Geneva, 
although it much resembles it in certain points of 
view. In picturesque beauty, it comes nearest to the 
Lake of Locarno in Italy, although it is destitute of 

the statement of Hegesippus, as applied by R el and to the text 
of Jcsephus: this makes it to equal 140 stadia, or seventeen 
miles and a half." Its breadth he judged to be not less than six 
miles. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



287 



any thing similar to the islands by which that majestic 
piece of water is adorned. It is inferior in magni- 
tude, and in the height of its surrounding mountains, 
to the Lake Asphaltites." Mr. Buckingham may 
perhaps be considered as having given the most ac- 
curate account, and one which reconciles in some 
degree the differing statements above cited, when, 
speaking of the lake as seen from Tel Hoom, he 
says — that its appearance is grand, but that the barren 
aspect of the mountains on each side, and the total 
absence of wood, give a cast of dulness to the picture ; 
this is increased to melancholy by the dead calm of 
its waters, and the silence which reigns throughout its 
whole extent, where not a boat or vessel of any kind 
is to be found. 

Among the pebbles on the shore, Dr. Clarke found 
pieces of a porous rock resembling toad-stone, its 
cavities filled with zeolite. Native gold is said to 
have been found here formerly. " We noticed," he 
says, " an appearance of this kind, but, on account 
of its trivial nature, neglected to pay proper attention 
to it. The water was as clear as the purest crystal, 
sweet, cool, and most refreshing. Swimming to a 
considerable distance from the shore, we found it so 
limpid that we could discern the bottom covered with 
shining pebbles. Among these stones was a beauti- 
ful, but very diminutive kind of shell, a nondescript 
species of Buccinum, which we have called Buccinum 
Galilceum. We amused ourselves by diving for speci- 
mens ; and the very circumstance of discerning such 
small objects beneath the surface, may prove the high 
transparency of the water." The situation of the 
lake, lying as it were in a deep basin between the 
hills which enclose it on all sides, excepting only the 
narrow entrance and outlets of the Jordan at either 



288 



PALESTINE; OR, 



end, protects its waters from long-continued tempests ! 
its surface is in general as smooth as that of the Dead 
Sea. But the same local features render it occasion- 
ally subject to whirlwinds, squalls, and sudden gusts 
from the mountains, of short duration : especially, 
when the strong current formed by the Jordan is 
opposed by a wind of this description from the S.E., 
sweeping from the mountains with the force of a 
hurricane, it may easily be conceived that a boisterous 
sea must be instantly raised, which the small vessels 
of the country would be unable to resist. A storm 
of this description is plainly denoted by the language 
of the evangelist, in recounting one of our Lord's 
miracles. " There came doivn a storm of wind on the 
lake, and they were filled with water, and were in 

jeopardy Then he arose, and rebuked the wind 

and the raging of the water ; and they ceased, and 
there was a calm."* 

There were fleets of some force on this lake during 
the wars of the Jews with the Romans, and very 
bloody battles were fought between them. Josephus < 
gives a particular account of a naval engagement be- 
tween the Romans under Vespasian, and the Jewsfwho 
had revolted during the administration of Agrippa. 
Titus and Trajan were both present, and Vespasian 
himself was on board the Roman fleet. The rebel 
force consisted of an immense multitude, who, as 
fugitives after the capture of Tarichsea by Titus, had 
sought refuge on the water. The vessels in which 
the Romans defeated them, were built for the occa- 
sion, and yet were larger than the Jewish ships. The 
victory was followed by so terrible a slaughter of the 
Jews, that nothing was to be seen, either on the lake 

* Luke yffi, 23, 24, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



289 



or its shores, but the blood and mangled corses of the 
slain, and the air was infected by the number of dead 
bodies. Six thousand five hundred persons are stated 
to have perished in this naval engagement and in the 
battle of Tarichaea, besides twelve hundred who were 
afterwards massacred in cold blood by order of Ves- 
pasian, in the amphitheatre at Tiberias, and a vast 
number who were given to Agrippa as slaves.* 

Of the numerous towns which formerly nourished 
on the shores of this lake, few traces now remain, and 
there is some difficulty in determining even the sites 
of those whose names have come down to us. About 
an hour and a quarter to the northward of Tiberias, 
following the course of the lake, is a small Mahom- 
medan village called Migdal, -f- (which signifies in 
Hebrew a tower,) where there are considerable re- 
mains of a very indifferent castle, that may possibly 
have given its name to the place. It is seated near 
the edge of the lake, beneath a range of high cliffs, 
in which are seen small grottoes or caves. The ruins 
consist of an old square tower and some larger build- 
ings of rude construction, apparently ancient. It is 
generally supposed that this is the Magdala of the 
Gospels, and the Migdal of the earlier Scriptures. $ 
But Pococke objects against this opinion, that Mag- 
dala seems to have been in the same direction as 
Dalmanutha, which he supposes to have been on the 
eastern coast. This, however, is far from certain. 
He places it at the S.E. corner of the plain, which, 
he says, " must be what Josephus calls the country of 
Gennesareth, and which he describes as thirty stadia 
long from north to south, and twenty broad, that is, 

* Joseph. Wars, book iii. chap. 17. 
t Burckhardt writes it El Medjdel.' 
j Matt. xv. 30. Joshua xix. 38. 
PAKT II. S 



290 PALESTINE ; OS, 



from the Vale of Doves (Wady Hymam) to the sea." 
" This plain," he adds, u is a very fertile spot of 
ground. About the middle of the plain, or rather 
towards the north side, there is a very fine fountain, 
about one hundred feet in diameter, enclosed with a 
circular wall six feet high, on which account it is 
called the round fountain : it runs off in a stream 
through the plain into the lake, and is probably the 
fountain mentioned by Josephus, by the name of 
Cesaina, as watering this plain. The water seems 
to be that which was called the spring of Capernaum, 
from which one may suppose that Capernaum was at 
the lake where this rivulet falls into it."* 

Burckhardt and Captain Mangles describe, half an 

* " The country also that lies over against this lake hath the 
same name of Gennesareth. Its nature is wonderful, as well as 
its beauty: its soil is so fruitful that all sorts of trees can grow 
upon it, and the inhabitants accordingly plant all sorts of trees 
there ; for the temper of the air is so well mixed that it agrees very 
well with those several sorts ; particularly walnuts, which require 
the coldest air, flourish there in vast plenty ; there are palm-trees 
also, which grow best in hot air ; fig-trees also and olives grow 
near them, which yet require an air that is more temperate. One 
may call this place the ambition of nature, where it forces those 
plants that are naturally enemies to one another, to agree to- 
gether. It is a happy contention of the seasons, as if every one 
of them laid claim to this country; for it not only nourishes 
different sorts of autumnal fruit beyond men's expectation, but 
preserves them also a great while. It supplies men with the prin- 
cipal fruits, with grapes and figs continually, during ten months 
of the year, and the rest of the fruits as they become ripe together 
through the whole year. For besides the good temperature of the 
air, it is also watered from a most fertile fountain. The people of 
the country call it Capharnaum. Some have thought it to be a 
vein of the Nile, because it produces the ccracin fish as well as 
that lake does which is near to Alexandria. The length of this 
country extends itself along the banks of this lake, that bears the 
same name, for thirty furlongs, and is in breadth twenty. And 
this is the nature of that place." — Josbphus, Warn, book iii. 
Chap. 10, 5 8. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



291 



hour to the west of Magdala, on the northern side of 
the entrance of a wady or ravine, a curious ancient 
fortification to which the natives give the name of the 
Castle of the Pigeons {Kalaai Hamam\ on account, 
Burckhardt says, of the vast quantity of wild pigeons 
that breed there. A high perpendicular cliff projects 
so as to form a natural barrier on two sides of a 
triangle, and the remaining side is defended by a wall 
of rough masonry with numerous projecting turrets. 
" It is certainly very antique, and Mr. Bankes thinks, 
prior to the time of the Romans. It may possibly," 
adds Captain Mangles, a be the ancient Jotapata." 
This conjecture, however, is not supported by the 
description, which hardly agrees with the situation 
of Jotapata as given by Josephus.* It is evidently 
the same place as Pococke refers to under the name 
of the Valley of Doves (or Pigeons). " Two miles 
N.E. of Hutin," he says, " and north of the plain of 
Hutin, is a narrow pass called Waad Hymam (the 
Valley of Doves), which is a descent between two 
rocky mountains into the plain of Gennesareth, which 
is westward of the middle part of the Sea of Tiberias. 
These mountains are full of sepulchral grots, which 
probably belonged to the towns and villages near. 
On the north side of the hill, over the plain of Genne- 
sareth, there is a fortress cut into the perpendicular 
rock a considerable height, with a great number of 
apartments ; the ascent to which is very steep. It is 
said by some to be the work, at least the improve- 
ment, of Feckerdine." f He goes on to state, as the 

* Wars, book iii. chap. 7, § 7. 

f With this, Burckhardt's description accurately agrees. " In 
the calcareous mountain are many natural caA'erns, which have 
been united together by passages cut in the rock, and enlarged in 



292 



PALESTINE; OR, 



reason of his mentioning this pass so particularly, that 
south of it, in the plain of Hutin, and about two miles 
west of the Sea of Tiberias, are the ruins of a town 
or large village, which still bears the name of Bait- 
sida, and must have been the ancient Bethsaida of 
Galilee. " There are ruins of a large cistern and 
other buildings here, and particularly great remains 
of a church, and of a very fine worked door-case to 
it, and some columns." The Bethsaida to which 
Philip the Tetrarch gave the name of Julias,* in 
honour of Csesar's daughter, the learned author con- 
cludes to have been a different place ; it was situated 
in the lower Gaulonitis ; and he contends, that as its 
name was changed before our Lord frequented these 
parts, it would not have been referred to by the 
evangelist under any other appellation. It is certain, 
indeed, that the Bethsaida of the evangelists, as well 
as Chorazin and Capernaum with which it is asso- 
ciated, was in Galilee.-]* 

order to render them more commodious for habitation. Walls 
also have been built across the natural openings, so that no person 
could enter them except through the narrow communicating pas- 
sages; and wherever the nature of the almost perpendicular cliff 
permitted it, small bastions were built to defend the castle, which 
has been thus rendered almost impregnable. The perpendicular 
cliff forms its protection above, and the access from below is by a 
narrow path, so steep as not to allow of a horse mounting it. In the 
midst of the caverns several deep cisterns have been hewn." The 
place might, he thinks, shelter about 600 men ; and he supposes it 
to be the work of some powerful robber about the time of the 
Crusades, as a few vaults of communication, with pointed arches, 
denote Gothic architecture. — Travels in Syria, p. 331, 

* There was another Julias, in Perea, on the east side of the 
lake, the ancient name of which was Eetherampta. This was 
built by Herod Antipas. See Josephus, Jewish Wars, book ii, 
chap. 9. 

f John xii. 21. Matt. xi. 21, 23, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



293 



With regard to Chorazin, Pococke says that he 
could find nothing like the name except at a village 
called Gerasi, which is among the hills west of the 
place called Telhoue in the plain of Gennesareth. Dr. 
Richardson, in passing through this plain, inquired 
of the natives whether they knew such a place as 
Capernaum? They immediately rejoined, M Caverna- 
hum wa Chorasi, they are quite near, but in ruins.' * 
This evidence sufficiently fixes the proximity of 
Chorazin to Capernaum, in opposition to the opinion 
that it was on the east side of the lake ; and it is 
probable that the Gerasi of Pococke is the same place, 
the orthography only being varied, as Dr. Richard- 
son's Chorasi. 

Capernaum was on the sea-coast, on the borders of 
Zabulon and Naphthali.* Mr. Buckingham mentions 
an Arab station, said to have been formerly called 
Capharnaoom, upon the edge of the lake, from nine to 
twelve miles N.N.E. of Tiberias, bearing at present 
only the name of Talhewn, -f — the Telhoue of Po- 
cocke, who describes it as lying at the eastern foot 
of the hills north of the plain of Gennesareth, and 
supposes (but it is evidently an erroneous conjec- 
ture) that it is the ancient Tarichea. The ruins, he 
says, extend considerably to the north along the lake. 
Among them he saw the remains of a small church, 
of white marble, with some pilasters about it ; he 
observed also a round port for small boats. Mr. Buck- 
ingham says : 44 Tal-hhewn, though now only a sta- 
tion of Bedouins, appears to have been the site of 
some considerable settlement, as ruined buildings, 
hewn stones, broken pottery, &c, are scattered around 

* Matt. iv. 13. 

| Burckhardt writes it Tel Hoom, which is somewhat nearer the 
supposed ancient name. 



294 



PALESTINE; OR, 



here over a wide space. The foundations of a large 
and magnificent edifice are still to be traced here, 
though there remains not sufficient of the building 
itself to decide whether it was a temple or a palace. 
It appears to have had its greatest length from north 
to south, and thus presented a narrow front towards 
the lake. The northern end of the building is sixty- 
five paces in length ; and, as the foundation of the 
eastern wall appears to extend from hence down 
close to the sea, it must have been nearly four times 
that measurement, or two hundred paces in extent. 
"Within this space are seen large blocks of sculptured 
stone, in friezes, cornices, mouldings, &c, and among 
them two masses which looked like pannels of some 
sculptured wall. I conceived them at first to have 
been stone doors, but they were too thick for that 
purpose, and had no appearance of pivots for hinges ; 
nor could they have been sarcophagi, as they were 
both perfectly solid. The sculpture seems to have 
been originally fine, but is now much defaced by time. 
The block was nine spans long, four and a half spans 
wide, and two spans thick in its present state, and lay 
on its edge against other hewn stones. 

" Among the singularities we noticed here, were 
double pedestals, double shafts, and double capitals, 
attached to each other in one solid mass, having been 
perhaps thus used at the angles of colonnades. There 
were at least twenty pedestals of columns within this 
area, occupying their original places, besides many 
others overturned and removed, and all the capitals 
we saw were of the Corinthian order and of a large 
size. 

" Near to this edifice, and close upon the edge of 
the lake, are the walls of a solid building, evidently 
constructed with fragments of the adjacent ruins, as 



THE HOLY LAND. 



295 



there are seen in it shafts of pillars worked into the 
masonry, as well as pieces of sculptured stones inter- 
mingled with plain ones. This small building is 
vaulted within, though the Arabs have raised a flat 
terrace on its roof ; and a poor family, with their 
cattle, now use the whole for their dwelling. 

" To the north-east of this spot, about two hundred 
yards, are the remains of a small domestic bath, the 
square cistern, and channels for supplying it with 
water, being still perfect ; and close by is a portion 
of the dwelling to which it was probably attached, 
with a narrow winding stair-case on one of its sides. 
The blocks of the great edifice are exceedingly large ; 
and these, as well as the materials of the smaller 
buildings and the fragments scattered around in every 
direction, are chiefly of the black porous stone which 
abounds throughout the western shores of the lake. 
Some masses of coarse white marble are seen, how- 
ever, in the centre of the large ruin, and some sub- 
terraneous work appears to have been constructed 
there of that substance. The whole has an air of 
great antiquity, both from its outward appearance 
and its almost complete destruction, but the style of 
the architecture is evidently Roman." 

Upon what authority this site is said to have borne 
the name of Capernaum, does not appear ; but it 
must be very strong to overbalance the obvious ob- 
jections to the conjecture. In the first place, Dr. 
Richardson's information is positive, that the ruins of 
Capernaum still retain their ancient name. Secondly, 
there is no reason to suppose that that town was ever 
a place of such consequence as these ruins indicate. 
Its being " exalted to heaven"* is to be understood 



* Matt. xL 23. 



296 PALESTINE; OR, 

of its having had our Lord for an inhabitant. Fur- 
ther, the modern appellation is a strong presumption 
against the supposition, as the Arabs never change 
the ancient names, except by corrupting them. Van 
Egmont and Heyman mention another place, about 
three hours' journey from Tiberias, " where are the 
ruins of a city which seems to have been large : the 
country people call it Misdel, and pretended it to be 
the ancient Capernaum." To this it has probably no 
better claim than Talhewn has ; but the statement 
shews how little dependence is to be placed on vague 
reports of the kind, unsupported by the present names 
of the places. Assuredly, none of the country people 
know what any place, that has lost its ancient appella- 
tion, used to be called eighteen hundred years ago. 

Burckhardt states, that at Tel Hoom, there is a well 
of salt water called Tennour Ayoub, and the rivulet 
El Eshe empties itself into the lake just by. At some 
short distance, more to the S.W., is a spring near the 
border of the lake, called Ain Tabegha, with a few 
houses and a corn-mill ; but the water is so strongly 
impregnated with salt as not to be drinkable. This 
must be the place which Mr. Buckingham calls 
Tahhbahh, where he found only one Arab family; 
but he states that there are several hot springs here, 
of the same nature as those below Oom Kais, but 
much more copious. " Around them," he says, 4i are 
remains of four large baths, each supplied by its own 
separate spring, and each having an aqueduct for 
carrying off its superfluous waters into the lake, from 
which they are distant about three hundred yards. 
The most perfect of these baths is an open octangular 
basin of excellent masonry, stuccoed on the inside, 
being one hundred and five paces in circumference, 
and about twenty-five feet in depth. We descended 



THE HOLY LAND. 



297 



to it by a narrow flight of ten stone steps, which lead 
to a platform about twelve feet square, and elevated 
considerably above the bottom of the bath, so that 
the bathers might go from thence into deeper water 
below. This large basin is now nearly filled with tall 
reeds, growing up from the bottom ; but its aqueduct, 
which is still perfect, and arched near the end, carries 
down a full and rapid stream to turn the mill erected 
at its further end. On the sides of this aqueduct are 
seen incrustations similar to those described on the 
aqueduct of Tyre, leading from the cisterns of Solo- 
mon at Ras-el-ayn, and occasioned, no doubt, by the 
same cause. The whole of the Work, both of the 
baths and its aqueduct, appears to be Roman ; and 
it is executed with the care and solidity which gene- 
rally mark the architectural labours of that people. 
At a short distance beyond this, to the eastward, is a 
small circular building called Hemmam-el-Aioobe, or 
the Bath of Job, but it is apparently of the same age 
as those near it." 

To the south of Tabegha, returning towards Ti- 
berias, and still keeping the border of the lake, is a 
ruined khan, called Khan Mennye or Munney; a 
large and well-constructed building. " Here begins," 
says Burckhardt, (coming from the north,) " a plain 
of about twenty minutes in breadth, to the north of 
which the mountain stretches down close to the lake. 
That plain is covered with the tree called down or 
theder, which bears a small yellow fruit like the 
zaarour.* It was now about mid-day, and the sun 

* Pococke, evidently referring to the same fruit, describes it as 
* ( a little sort of apple, which is not disagreeable ; it grows on a 
thorny tree, and, they say, ripens at all seasons- -If I do not 
mistake," he says, " it is the nabbok." 

S2 



298 PALESTINE; OR, 

intensely hot ; we therefore looked about for a shady 
spot, and reposed under a very large fig-tree, at the 
foot of which a rivulet of sweet water gushes out from 
beneath the rocks, and falls into the lake at a few 
hundred paces distant. The tree has given its name 
to the spring, Ain-el-Tin : near it are several other 
springs, which occasion a very luxuriant herbage along 
the borders of the lake."* This is undoubtedly the 
plain of Gennesareth, described by Josephus in such 
glowing language ; and the Ain-el-Tin must be M the 
fountain of Capernaum."-!- Here we have still the 
fig-tree asserting its claim to the soil, as mentioned 
by Josephus, as well as the doom, a species of palm. 
" The pastures of Mennye, Burckhardt adds, " are 
proverbial for their richness among the inhabitants of 
the neighbouring countries. High reeds grow along 
the shore, but I found none of the aromatic reeds and 
rushes mentioned by Strabo." 

Here then, if the authority of Josephus may be 
built upon, we should expect to find traces of the 
ancient Capernaum.:}: Between Khan Mennye and 
El Medjdel, a distance of about three miles, there 
occurs no modern village. It remains for future 
travellers to pursue the inquiry, and ascertain whe- 
ther any thing remains besides the name of that once 
favoured town ; or whether our Saviour's denuncia- 

* Travels in Syria, p. 319. 
f See preceding note at p. 290. 

± From comparing the parallel passages, Matt. xiv. 34, and 
John vL 23, 24, it would appear, that Capernaum was certainly in 
the land of Germesareth, and not far from Tiberias. Churches 
were built, by order Of Constantine, at Capernaum, Tiberias, and 
Sepphoury. Some traces of such an edifice will probably remain 
to identify the site— unless Tel Hoom was even at that time taken 
for Capernaum. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



299 



tion against it has been literally accomplished, that it 
should be cast down as it were into the grave.* 

" In thirty-eight minutes from Khan Mennye," 
continues Burckhardt, " we passed a small rivulet, 
which waters Wady Lymoun. At about an hour's 
distance from our road, up in the mountain, we saw 
the village Sendjol, about half an hour to the west 
of which lies the village Hottein. In forty-five 
minutes we passed the large branch of the Wady 
Lymoun. The mountains which border the lake, 
here terminate in a perpendicular cliff, which is 
basaltish, with an upper stratum of calcareous rock • 
and the shore changes from the direction S.W» by S. 
to that of S. by E. In the angle stands the miserable 
village El Medjdel, one hour distant from Ain-el-Tin. 
The Wady Hamam branches off from Medjdel. Pro- 
ceeding from hence, the shore of the lake is over- 
grown with dene (solarium furiosum), and there are 
several springs close to the water's side. At the end 
of two hours and a quarter from Ain-el-Tin, we 
reached Tabaria."-j- 

We must now, for the present, take leave of the 
immediate vicinity of this consecrated lake, and pro- 
ceed to explore the tract of country which lies west- 
ward of Tiberias ; having yet to visit Nazareth, the 
place where our Lord was brought up ; Mount Tabor, 
the supposed site of the transfiguration; and some 
other sites of peculiar interest. 

* Hades, rendered * hell' by our translators, Matt. xi. 23, h. e» 
miserrima et valde abjecta erit tua conditio.— -Schleusner. 
■J Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, pp. 320, 321. 



300 



PALESTINE; OR, 



FROM TIBERIAS TO NAZARETH. 

There are two direct roads to Nazareth ; one by- 
Kef er-Sebt and El Khan ; the other by Louby, which 
lies more to the south ; but travellers usually diverge 
a little from the direct route to visit some of the 
sacred places. The distance is computed to be nearly 
twenty miles. W-e here take for our guides Burck- 
hardt and Dr. Richardson. 

In one hour from Tabaria, the traveller passes a 
spring called Ain-el-Rahham. About half an hour 
further, he passes a rocky spot, with heaps of stones 
scattered around, called Khamsi Khabshaat, or " the 
place of the five loaves," from a belief that our Lord 
here wrought the miracle of feeding the five thousand 
with five loaves and two fishes. A large black stone 
is shewn as that on which he sat. Unfortunately, 
however, for the credit of the tradition, the miracle 
alluded to appears to have been wrought on the 
opposite side of the Sea of Tiberias.* Moreover it is, 
Mr. Buckingham says, u on the top of a high and 
rocky hill ; so that it does not correspond to the local 
features of the place described in any one particular, 
and may be cited as another proof of the bungling 
ignorance of those blind guides who so proudly call 
themselves the guardians of the holy places." Mr. 
Burckhardt mentions a place, the distance of which 
does not agree with this, being an hour further on, 
called Hedjar-el-Naszara^ the " stones of the Chris- 
tians." Here are four or five blocks of black stone, 
upon which Christ is said to have reclined while ad- 
dressing the multitude who flocked around him. The 
priests of Nazareth stopped to read some prayers over 

* Compare Matt. xiv. 13, 22, 34, and John vi, 1, 17* 24, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



301 



the stones. The road to this place leads over a high, 
uncultivated p.ain. Dr. Richardson describes it as 
a very hilly country, but says, the soil is deep, and 
of a good quality, producing excellent pasture ; it is, 
however, poorly stocked. Mount Hermon and Mount 
Tabor appear at a considerable distance on the left. 
Below the Stones, a small plain called Sahel Hottem 
extends towards the N.E., the vale of Hutin of Po- 
cocke. The country is intersected by wadys. About 
an hour's distance from the Stones, upon the same 
level, there is a hill of an oblong shape, with two 
projecting summits on one of its extremities : the 
natives call it Keroun Hottein^ the Horns of Hottein; 
but the Christians have given it the appellation of 
Mons Beatitudinis, the Mount of the Beatitudes, 
under which name it is described by both Maundrell 
and Pococke. From the plain to the south, it appears 
like a long, low hill with a mount at each end, and 
at first sight the whole hill appears to be rocky and 
uneven ; but the eastern mount is a level surface, 
covered with fine herbage. About the middle of this 
mount are the foundations of a small church, twenty- 
two feet square, on a ground a little elevated, which 
is the supposed place occupied by our Lord in deliver- 
ing the sermon on the mount." To the west of 
this is a tank or under-ground cistern. It is tedious 
to have to refute all the blundering legends which 
so industriously misplace the occurrences of sacred 
history. It is sufficiently clear, that the mountain 
into which our Lord had retired from the multitude, 
when his disciples came to him on the occasion re- 
ferred to, was near Capernaum,* to which he de- 
scended immediately from the hill ; for, 44 when he 



* Compare Matt. viii. 5. Luke vii. 1. 



302 PALESTINE; OR, 

had ended all his sayings in the audience of the peo- 
ple, he entered into" that town. That Capernaum 
Vvas not in this direction, is equally certain, on ac- 
count of the distance from the coast. The Horns of 
Hottein cannot be less distant from the plains of Gen- 
nesareth than from ten to twelve miles. If it has no 
pretensions, however, to its Christian name, the view 
which is afforded from its elevated summit, amply 
repays the ascent, and justifies the taste of the ubi- 
quitous Helena, or whoever fixed upon this site for 
the chapel of the beatitudes. " For its grandeur," 
says Dr. Clarke, " independently of the interest ex- 
cited by the different objects, there is nothing equal 
to it in the Holy Land. From this situation we 
perceived that the plain over which we had been 
riding (from Turan) is itself very elevated. Far 
beneath appeared other plains, one lower than the 
other, in a regular gradation, reaching eastward as 
far as the Sea of Galilee. This lake, almost equal 
in the grandeur of its appearance to that of Geneva, 
spreads its waters over all the lower territory, ex- 
tending from the north-east towards the south-west. 
Its. eastern shores exhibit a sublime scene of moun- 
tains towards the north and south, and they seem to 
close it in at either extremity. The cultivated plains 
reaching to its borders, which we beheld at an 
amazing depth below, resembled, by the various hues 
their different produce presented, the motley pattern 
of a vast carpet. To the north appeared snowy 
summits, towering beyond a series of intervening 
mountains. *. . . .To the south-west, at the distance 
of only twelve miles, we beheld Mount Tabor, having 
a conical form, and standing quite insular upon the 



* Probably Djebel Sheikh. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



303 



northern side of the wide plains of Esdraelon. The 
mountain whence this superb view was presented, con- 
sists entirely of limestone ; the prevailing constituent 
of all the mountains in Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, 
Phenicia, and Palestine."* 

The country becomes better inhabited, though the 
road still leads over an uneven, uncultivated track, as 
the traveller approaches Kefer Kenna, or Cane Galil ; 
the Cana where Christ performed his first miracle, of 
turning water into wine. Dr. Richardson says, that 
they passed several comfortable villages, with consi- 
derable cultivation on the hills and valleys round them. 
Cana itself is a neat village, with a copious spring, 
surrounded with plantations of olive and other fruit 
trees. Burckhardt makes it four hours and a quarter, 
Dr. Richardson about five hours and a half, from 
Tiberias ; but possibly their rate of travelling differed, 
and the distance may safely be computed at between 
fifteen and sixteen miles. " Here," says the latter, 
a in a small Greek church, we were shewn an old 
stone pot, made of the common compact limestone of 
the country, which, the hierophant informed us, is one 
of the original pots that contained the water which 

* Travels, &c. vol. iv. (8vo.) pp. 201, 202. Pococke has given 
a more specific account of the objects included in this extensive 
prospect. " To the S.W. I saw Jebel Sejar extending to Sephor, 
the tops of Carmel, then Jebel Turan near the Plain of Zabulon, 
which extends to Jebel Huttin. Beginning at the N.W. and going 
to the N.E., I saw Jebel Igermick, about which they named to 
me these places : Sekeneen, Elbany, Sejaour, Nah, Rameh, Mogor, 
Orady, Trenon, Kobresiad ; and further E. on other hills, Meirom, 
Tokin on a hill, and Nouesy. Directly N. of Huttin, and to the 
E. of the hill on which that city stands, Khan Tehar and Khan 
Eminie were mentioned ; and to the N. of the Sea of Tiberias, I 
saw Jebel Sheikh." Other villages were pointed out by his guide 
in other directions, but they are names of no interest. 



304 PALESTINE ; OR, 

underwent this miraculous change." In the village, 
Pococke saw a large ruined building, the walls of 
which were almost entire ; whether it was a house 
or a church, he could not well judge, but " they say, 
the house of the marriage was on this spot." Near it 
stood a "large new Greek church," — the one above 
mentioned ; and on the south side of the village, near 
the fountain, there were the ruins of another church, 
dedicated to St. Bartholomew, and said to have been 
his house. It seems, however, that there existed a 
schismatical division of opinion with regard to the 
whole legend. " The Greeks," he says, " have a tra- 
dition, that the miracle was wrought at Gana, on the 
west side of the Plain of Zabulon, about three or four 
miles N.W. of Sepphorah:" but these schismatics 
allow, that the water was carried there from this 
fountain, a distance of four or five miles. Quaresmius 
fixes the miracle here, while Adrichomius inclines 
to favour the other at Kana. Who shall decide, when 
such grave authorities differ ? The fountain, however, 
makes strongly against the said Adrichomius. Kepher 
Kenna contains about 300 inhabitants, chiefly Catholic 
Christians ; it is pleasantly situated on the descent of 
a hill, facing the south-west. 

The road now ascends, and continues across chalky 
hills, overgrown with low shrubs, till, in about an 
hour and a half, the traveller descends into the de- 
lightful Vale of Naszera (Nazareth). This is described 
as a circular basin encompassed by mountains. " It 
seems," says Dr. Richardson, " as if fifteen mountains 
met to form an enclosure for this delightful spot: 
they rise round it like the edge of a shell, to guard 
it from intrusion. It is a rich and beautiful field 
in the midst of barren mountains ; it abounds in fig- 



THE HOLY LAtfD. 



305 



trees, small gardens, and hedges of the prickly pear ; 
and the dense, rich grass affords an abundant pasture. 
The village stands on an elevated situation, on the 
west side of the valley. The convent stands at the east 
end of the village, on the high ground, just where the 
rocky surface joins the valley. 

Nassara, or Naszera, is one of the principal towns 
in the pashalic of Acre. Its inhabitants are indus- 
trious, because they are treated with less severity than 
those of the country-towns in general. The population 
is estimated at 3000, of whom 500 are Turks ; the 
remainder are Christians. There are about ninety 
Latin families, according to Burckhardt ; but Mr. 
Connor reports the Greeks to be the most numerous : 
there is, besides, a congregation of Greek Catholics, 
and another of Maronites. The Latin convent is a 
very spacious and commodious building, which was 
thoroughly repaired and considerably enlarged in 1730. 
The remains of the more ancient edifice, ascribed to 
the mother of Constantine, may be observed in the 
form of subverted columns, with fragments of capitals 
and bases of pillars, lying near the modern building. 
Pococke noticed, over a door, an old alto-relief of 
Judith cutting off the head of Holofernes. Within the 
convent is the Church of the Annunciation, containing 
the house of Joseph and Mary, the length of which is 
not quite the breadth of the church, but it forms the 
principal part of it. The columns and all the interior 
of the church are hung round with damask silk, which 
gives it a warm and rich appearance. Behind the 
great altar, is a subterranean cavern, divided into 
small grottoes, where the Virgin is said to have lived. 
Her kitchen, parlour, and bed-room are shewn, and 
also a narrow hole in the rock, in which the child 



306 



PALESTINE; OR, 



Jesus once hid himself from his persecutors.* The 
pilgrims who visit these holy spots, are in the habit of 
knocking off small pieces of stone from the walls, 
which are thus considerably enlarging. In the church 
a miracle is still exhibited to the faithful. In front of 
the altar are two granite columns, each two feet one 
inch in diameter, and about three feet apart. They 
are supposed to occupy the very places where the 
angel and the Virgin stood at the precise moment of 
the annunciation. -\- The innermost of these, that of 
the Virgin, has been broken away, some say by the 
Turks, in expectation of finding treasure under it; 
" so that," as Maundrell states, M eighteen inches' 
length of it is clean gone between the pillar and 
the pedestal." Nevertheless it remains erect, sus- 
pended from the roof, as if attracted by a load-stone. 
It has evidently no support below ; and though it 
touches the roof, the hierophant protests that it has 
none above. " All the Christians of Nazareth," says 
Burckhardt, " with the friars of course at their head, 
affect to believe in this miracle, though it is perfectly 
evident that the upper part of the column is connected 
with the roof." " The fact is," says Dr. Clarke, 
" that the capital and a piece of the shaft of a pillar 

* Pococke says : " They shew the spot from which they say the 
holy house of Loretto was removed." The story of its flight was 
gravely repeated to Mr. Jolliffe ; and he says, there are indentures 
in the wall to designate the space the apartment occupied, about 
twelve or fourteen feet by eight ! 

f " These pillars are said to have been erected by St. Helena, she 
having been divinely informed of the exact places : though this 
the Greeks dispute with the Latins, alleging, that the angel, not 
finding the Virgin at home, followed her to the fountain, whither 
she was gone to fetch water, and there delivered his message."— 
Van Egmont's Travels, vol. ii. p. 18. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



307 



of grey granite have been fastened on to the roof of 
the cave ; and so clumsily is the rest of the hocus pocus 
contrived, that what is shewn for the lower fragment 
of the same pillar resting upon the earth, is not of the 
same substance, but of Cipolino marble. About this 
pillar, a different story has been related by almost 
every traveller since the trick was devised. Maun- 
drell and Egmont and Heyman were told, that it was 
broken, in search, of hidden treasure, by a pasha who 
was struck with blindness for his impiety.* We were 
assured that it separated in this manner, when the 
angel announced to the Virgin the tidings of her con- 
ception. The monks had placed a rail, to prevent 
persons infected with the plague from coming to 
rub against these pillars ; this had been for many 
years their constant practice, whenever afflicted with 
any sickness. The reputation of the broken pillar, 
for healing every kind of disease, prevails all over 
Galilee." 

Burckhardt says, that this church, next to that 
of the Holy Sepulchre, is the finest in Syria, and 
contains two tolerably good organs. "Within the walls 
of the convent are two gardens, and a small burying 
ground : the walls are very thick, and serve occasion- 
ally as a fortress to all the Christians in the town. 
There are at present eleven friars in the convent ; 
they are chiefly Spaniards. The yearly expenses of 
the establishment are stated to amount to upwards of 
900/. a small part of which is defrayed by the rent 
of a few houses in the town, and by the produce of 
some acres of corn-land : the rest is remitted from 
Jerusalem. The whole annual expenses of the Terra 

* Bernardin Surius, President of the Holy Sepulchre, and Com- 
missary of the Holy Land, about the middle of the seventeenth 
Century, ascribes the fracture to a mogrebin* 



308 



PALESTINE; OR, 



Santa convents are about 15,000/., of which the Pasha 
of Damascus receives about 12,000/. The Greek con- 
vent of Jerusalem, according to Burckhardt's autho- 
rity, pays much more, as well to maintain its own 
privileges, as with a view to encroach upon those of 
the Latins. 

To the north-west of the convent is a small church, 
built over Joseph's workshop. Both Maundrell and 
Pococke describe it as in ruins ; but Dr. Clarke says : 
" This is now a small chapel, perfectly modern, and 
neatly white-washed." To the west of this is a small 
arched building, which, they say, is the synagogue 
where Christ exasperated the Jews, by applying the 
language of Isaiah to himself.* It once belonged to 
the Greeks ; but, Hasselquist says, was taken from 
them by the Arabs, who intended to convert it into a 
mosque, but afterwards sold it to the Latins. This 
was then so late a transaction, that they had not had 
time to embellish it. The "Mountain of the Precipi- 
tation," is at least two miles off ; so that, according 
to this authentic tradition, the Jews must have led our 
Lord a marvellous way. But the said precipice is 
shewn as that which the Messiah leaped down to escape 
from the Jews ; and as the monks could not pitch 
upon any other place frightful enough for the miracle, 
they contend that Nazareth formerly stood eastward of 
its present situation, upon a more elevated spot. Dr. 
Clarke, however, says, that the situation of the modern 
town answers exactly to the description of St. Luke. 
" Induced/' he says, " by the words of the Gospel, to 

* Luke iv. 16, 28. Mr. Jolliffe, apparently alluding to the same 
building, describes it as " the school where Christ received the 
first rudiments of his education." Major Mackworth was told 
the same tale in 1821 ; so that this appears the newest and most 
approved tradition. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



309 



examine the place more attentively than we should 
otherwise have done, we went, as it is written, out 
of the city, 4 to the brow of the hill whereon the city 
is built,' and came to a precipice corresponding to the 
words of the Evangelist. It is above the Maronite 
church, and probably the precise spot alluded to by 
the text.'* 

But the most precious and celebrated relic of which 
Nazareth can boast, is our Lord's dining-table, a large 
stone at which the monks affirm that he dined both 
before and after his resurrection. It is of the common 
hard limestone of the country, is stuck fast in the 
ground, and its upper surface declines. Hasselquist 
states, that it is said to have been formerly covered 
with iron plates, " the marks of which are yet to be 
seen." They have built a chapel over it ; and upon 
the walls, several copies of a printed certificate are 
affixed, asserting its title to reverence.* There is not, 
Dr. Clarke says, an object in all Nazareth so much 
the resort of pilgrims, Greeks, Catholics, Arabs, and 
even Turks, as this stone ; " the two former classes, 
on account of the seven years' indulgence granted 
to those who visit it ; the two latter, because they 
believe that some virtue must reside within a stone 
before which all comers are so eager to prostrate 
themselves." 

w About a furlong to the north of the village, is 

* Papal certificate, transcribed by Dr. Clarke. — " Tradictio 
eontinua est, et nunquam interrupta, apud omnes nationes Orientates, 
hanc petram, dictam Mensa Christi, Mam ipsam esse supra quam 
Dominus noster Jesus Christus cum suis comedit Discipulis, ante 
et post suam resurrectionem a mortuis. Et Sancta Romano, Ec~ 
clesia Indulgentiam concessit septem annorum et totidem quadra- 
genarum, omnibus Christi fidelibus hunc sanctum locum visiiantibua, 
recitando saltern ibi unum Pater, et Ave, dummodo sit in statu 
gratice." 



310 



PALESTINE; OR, 



a fountain, over which is an arch ; it runs into a 
beautiful marble rase, that seems to have been a 
tomb. Beyond it is a Greek church, under-ground, 
where, the Greeks say, the angel Gabriel first saluted 
the Blessed Virgin ; there is a fountain in it, and 
formerly, there was a church built over it.' , * 

The road to the " mountain of the precipitation" 
lies over a tolerably level space for about a mile, wind- 
ing in a southern direction ; it then becomes necessary 
to dismount, on account of the ruggedness of the road, 
which descends into a deep ravine between two hills. 
After scrambling up the southern point for about a 
quarter of an hour, you arrive at an altar in a recess 
hewn out of the rock, and some remains of a mosaic 
pavement. Near it are two large circular cisterns, 
well stuccoed inside, and several portions of buildings, 
said to be the remains of an establishment founded 
by St. Helena. The monks come here sometimes, to 
celebrate mass. Immediately over this spot, about 
forty feet higher, two large flat stones are set up 
edgeways, like a parapet wall, close to the edge of the 
precipice ; and here, they say, the Jews would have 
thrown down our Saviour. In the centre, and scat- 
tered over different parts of one of them, are several 
round marks, like the deep imprint of fingers in wax, 
which are shewn as the prints of Christ's hands and 

* Pococke.— Dr. Clarke speaks of a fountain in the valley, 
which he denominates the Fountain of the Virgin, but which 
Pococke calls Beer-Emir, the Well of the Prince, where he saw 
an ancient marble coffin, with three festoons in relief. It is to 
the west of Nazareth. Mr. Jolliffe says: " In a Greek church, 
about two furlongs from this spot (Mensa Christi), there is a 
fountain where the mother of Jesus was accustomed to resort ; 
the water is pure and of sweet flavour." Dr. Clarke has pro- 
bably confounded this Fountain of the Virgin with Beer* 
Emir, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



311 



feet, when he resisted the Jews, and so escaped being 
precipitated ; although other authorities, equally cre- 
ditable, state that he leaped down, and Brocardus 
says, the place is called Saltus Domini, the Lord's leap. 
This is assuredly the most bungling of all the absurd 
traditions which have been coined by the fertile brains 
of the monks. The situation is all but inaccessible ; 
it is not on a hill on which Nazareth could ever have 
been built ; it is two miles from the supposed syna- 
gogue ; and, as if the representation which makes our 
Lord cling to a stone for safety, were not absurd 
enough, the supposed marks are such as could not 
have been made by any possible position of the human 
hand in a less unyielding substance. 

When the French invaded Syria, Nazareth was 
occupied by six or eight hundred men, whose ad- 
vanced posts were at Tabaria and Szaffad. Two 
hours from hence, in the Plain of Esdraelon, near the 
village of Foule, General Kleber sustained, with a 
corps not exceeding 1,500 men, the attack of the whole 
Syrian army, amounting, it is said, to 25,000. Having 
formed his battalion into a square, he continued fight- 
ing from sun-rise to mid-day, until they had expended 
almost all their ammunition. Bonaparte, informed of 
his perilous situation, then advanced to his support 
with 600 men ; at the sight of whom the Turks, panic- 
struck, took precipitately to flight : several thousands 
were killed, and many drowned in the river Daboury, 
which then inundated part of the plain. Bonaparte 
dined at Nazareth, and then returned to Acre. After 
the retreat of the French from Acre, Djezzar Pasha 
resolved on causing all the Christians in his dominions 
to be massacred, and had actually sent orders to that 
effect to Nazareth and Jerusalem. But Sir Sidney 
Smith, on being apprized of his intention, sent him 



312 PALESTINE; OR> 

word, that if a single Christian head should fall, he 
would bombard Acre, and set it on fire. Sir Sidney's 
interference is still remembered with heartfelt grati- 
tude by all the Christians, "who look upon him as their 
deliverer. M His word," says Burckhardt, " I have 
often heard both Turks and Christians exclaim, was 
like God's word — it never failed." * 

The Christians of Nazareth enjoy great liberty. 
" I was told," says the last-mentioned traveller, " that 
about thirty years ago, the padre guardiano of the 
convent was also sheikh, or chief-justice of the town, 
an office for which he paid a certain yearly sum to the 
Pasha of Acre. The police of the place was conse- 
quently in his hands ; and when any disturbance 
happened, the reverend father used to take his stick, 
repair to the spot, and lay about him freely, no matter 
whether upon Turks or Christians." The guardian 
has still much influence in the town ; and the fathers 
of the convent go a shooting in their monastic habits, 
to several hours' distance from the town, without ever 
being insulted by the Turks. At the , time of Burck- 
hardt's visit, however, the personage of chief conse- 
quence at Nazareth, was M. Catafogo, a native of 
Aleppo, but of Frank origin. He rented from the 
Pasha about twelve villages in the neighbourhood, for 
about 3000J. and his profits were said to be consider- 
able. He was a merchant, and meddled much in the 
politics and intrigues of the country, by which means 
he had become a person of great consequence. 

ROUTE FROM NAZARETH TO SZALT. 

From Nazareth there is a route, frequented by 
merchants, through Bisan to Szalt, which was taken 



* Burckhardt's Travels La Syria, pp. 340, 341. 



THE HOLY LAXD. 



313 



by Burckhardt. In two hours from Nazareth, he 
passed a small rivulet ; in two hours and a half, the 
village Denouny, and near it, the ruins of Endor, 
where, he says, the witch's grotto is shewn. He 
crossed the Plain of Esdraelon, in a S.S.E. direction ; 
and, leaving Mount Tabor to the left, in five hours 
and a half reached the village of Om-el-Taybe, be- 
longing to the district of Djebel Nablous, or, as it 
is also called, Belled Harthe. At six hours and three 
quarters, he passed the village of Meraszrasz, upon 
the summit of a chain of hills on the side of "VVady 
Oeshe, which falls into the Jordan ; and then descend- 
ing, in about seven hours and three quarters from 
Nazareth, reached the bottom of the Valley of El 
Ghor. Half an hour further, pursuing the valley 
southwards, brought him to Bisan. Here the chain of 
mountains bordering the valley, declines considerably 
in height, presenting merely elevated ground, quite 
open to the west ; but at one hour's distance, towards 
the south, the mountains begin again. Crossing the 
valley in a S.S.E. direction, our traveller arrived at 
the banks of the Jordan, where it is fordable ; it was 
then (July) about eighty paces broad, and about three 
feet deep. After passing the river, he continued his 
route close along the foot of the eastern mountain. 
In half an hour from the ford, he crossed Wady 
Mous ; in one hour and a quarter, Wady Yabes ; and 
in two hours came to a stony and hilly district, inter- 
sected by several deep but dry wadys, called Kern-el- 
Hemar, the ass's horn : it projects into the Ghor 
about four miles, and, when seen from the north, 
appears to close the valley. A fertile tract succeeds to 
this hilly ground, overgrown with bouttom, or wild 
pistachio-trees. At the end of six hours, the traveller 
passed to the right the ruins of Amata, on the declu 
PART II, T 



314 PALESTINE; Ottj 

vity of the mountain, whence a small rivulet descends 
into the plain. In six hours and a half he reached 
Mezar Abou Obeida. A quarter of an hour further is 
the northern branch of Nahr-el-Zerka, the principal 
stream being at the distance of one hour from Abou 
Obeida. The road then ascends the mountain by a 
steep acclivity : it is calcareous rock, with layers of 
various-coloured sand-stone and basalt. On the sum- 
mit is a ruined site, which the Arabs called El Meysera. 
The road continues over an uneven tract, along the 
summit of the mountain ridge, which forms the 
northern limits of the district called El Belka. 
" Here," says Burckhardt, " we were refreshed by 
cool winds, and every where found a grateful shade of 
fine oak, and wild pistachio-trees, with a scenery more 
like that of Europe than any I had yet seen in Syria." 
At the end of two hours from Meysera, he reached 
the foot of the mountain called Djebel Djelaad, or 
Djelaoud, the Gilead of the Scriptures, on which there 
is a ruined town of the same name. In three hours 
and a quarter, he passed near the top of Djebel Osha, 
which overlooks the whole of the Belka. The forest 
here grows thicker, consisting of oak, pistachio, balout, 
and keykab trees. In three hours and three quarters, 
he descended the southern side of the mountain near 
the tomb of Osha ; and in three quarters of an hour 
more, reached Szalt. We have given this brief outline 
of the whole route from Nazareth, as it occurs in 
Burckhardt, but reserve a further description of the 
country east of the Jordan for another place. 

MOUNT TABORe 

Mount Tabor, having been pitched upon as the 
scene of the Transfiguration, ranks among the sacred 



THE HOLY LAND. 



3l5> 



places to which pilgrims repair from Nazareth. It is 
minutely described by both Pococke and Maundrell. 

The road from Nazareth lies for two hours between 
low hills ; it then opens into the Plain of Esdraelon. 
At about two or three furlongs within the plain, and 
six miles from Nazareth, rises this singular mount, 
which is almost entirely insulated, its figure repre- 
senting a half-sphere.* " It is," says Pococke, " one 
of the finest hills I ever beheld, being a rich soil that 
produces excellent herbage, and is most beautifully 
adorned with groves and clumps of trees. The ascent 
is so easy, that we rode up the north side by a winding 
road. Some authors mention it as near four miles 
high, others as about two : the latter may be true, as 
to the winding ascent up the hill. The top of it, 
which is about half a mile long, and near a quarter 
of a mile broad, is encompassed with a wall, which 
Josephus built in forty days : there was also a wall 
along the middle of it, which divided the south part, 
on which the city stood, from the north part, which is 
lower, and is called the meidan, or place, being pro- 
bably used for exercises when there was a city here, 
Avhich Josephus mentions by the name of Ataburion. 
Within the outer wall on the north side, are several 
deep fosses, out of which, it is probable, the stones 
were dug to build the walls ; and these fosses seem 
to have answered the end of cisterns, to preserve the 
rain-water, and were also some defence to the city. 
There are likewise a great number of cisterns under- 
ground, for preserving the rain-water. To the south, 
where the ascent was most easy, there are fosses cut 
on the outside, to render the access to the walls more 

* Mr. Jolliffe says, «« that of a cone with the point struck off;" 
which most correctly describes its appearance. 



316 



PALESTINE; OR, 



difficult. Some of the gates also of the city remain : 
as Bab-el~houah, the gate of the winds, to the west : 
and Bab-el-kubbe, the arched gate, a small one to the 
south.* Antiochus, King of Syria, took the fortress 
on the top of this hill. Vespasian also got possession of 
it ; and, after that, Josephus fortified it with strong 
walls. But what has made it more famous than any 
thing else, is the common opinion, from the time of 
St. Jerome, that the transfiguration of our Saviour 
was on this mountain. On the east part of the hill 
are the remains of a strong castle ; and within the 
precinct of it is the grot, in which are three altars in 
memory of the three tabernacles which St. Peter pro- 
posed to build, and where the Latin fathers always 
celebrate on the day of the Transfiguration. It is 
said, there was a magnificent church built here by 
St. Helena, which was a cathedral when this town 
was made a bishop's see. There was formerly a con- 
vent of Benedictine monks here ; and, on another part 
of the hill, a monastery of Basilians, where the Greeks 
have an altar, and perform their service on the festival 
of the Transfiguration. On the side of the hill, they 
shew a church in a grot, where they say Christ 
charged his disciples not to tell what things they had 
seen till he was glorified." 

* Burckhardt, describing the spot, says: "A thick wall, con- 
structed of large stones, may be traced quite round the summit, 
close to the edge of the precipice : on several parts of it are the 
remains of bastions. The area is overspread with the ruins of pri- 
vate dwellings, built of stone with great solidity." 

f " I cannot forbear to mention in this place an observation, 
which is very obvious to all that visit the Holy Land, viz. that 
almost all passages and histories related in the Gospel, are repre- 
sented by them that undertake to shew where every thing was 
done, as having been done most of them in grottoes; and that 
even in such cases where the condition and the circumstances of 



THE HOLY LAND. 



317 



MaundreiPs account is singularly at variance with 
the above description, in respect to the extent of the 
plain on the summit. " After a very laborious as- 
cent," he says, " which took up near an hour, we 
reached the highest part of the mountain. It has 
a plain area at top, most fertile and delicious, of an 
oval figure, extended about one furlong in breadth, 
and two in length. This area is enclosed with trees 
on all parts, except toward the south." Hasselquist 
agrees more nearly with Pococke, but yet differs from 
both. " After travelling two hours (from Nazareth), 
we began to ascend Tabor, cooled by its agreeable 
dew, and refreshed by the milk of its fine herds of 
goats. It was a league up to the top, stony and 
difficult ; but we did not, however, dismount. On 
the top of it is a fine plain, the sides of it rocky. The 
hill is round, hath no precipices, is about four leagues 
in circumference, beautiful and fruitful." Van Eg- 
mont and Heyman give the following account :— 
" This mountain, though somewhat rugged and diffi- 
cult, we ascended on horseback, making several circuits 

the actions themselves seem to require places of another nature. 
Thus, if you would see the place where St. Anne was delivered of 
the blessed Virgin, you are carried to a grotto; if the place of 
the Annunciation, it is also a grotto; if the place where the 
blessed Virgin saluted Elizabeth, if that of the Baptist's, or that 
of our blessed Saviour's nativity, if that of the agony, or that of 
St. Peter's repentance, or that where the apostles made the creed, 
or this of the transfiguration, all these places are also grottoes. 
And, in a word, wherever you go, you find almost every thing 
is represented as done under ground. Certainly grottoes were 
anciently held in great esteem, or else they could never have 
been assigned, in spite of all probability, for the places in which 
were done so many various actions. Perhaps it was the hermits' 
way of living in grottoes, from the fifth or sixth century down- 
ward, that has brought them ever since to be in so great reputa- 
tion, 'r— Journey from Aleppo, Sfc. 

T 2 



318 PALESTINE; OB, 

round it, which took us up about three quarters of an 
hour. It is one of the highest in the whole country, 
being thirty stadia^ or about four English miles, a 
circumference that rendered it more famous.* And 
it is the most beautiful I ever saw, with regard to 
verdure, being every where decorated with small oak 
trees, and the ground universally enamelled with a 
variety of plants and flowers, except on the south side, 

where it is not so fully covered with verdure. -j- 

On this mountain are great numbers of red partridges, 
and some wild-boars ; and we were so fortunate as to 
see the Arabs hunting them. We left, but not with- 
out reluctancy, this delightful place, and found at the 
bottom of it a mean village, called Deboura, or Tabour, 
a name said to be derived from the celebrated Deborah 
mentioned in Judges." 

Pococke notices this village, which stands on a rising 
ground at the foot of Mount Tabor westward ; and 
the learned traveller thinks, that it may be the same 
as the Daberath, or Daberah, mentioned in the Book 
of Joshua, as on the borders of Zabulon and Issachar.J 
" Any one," he adds, " who examines the fourth 
chapter of Judges, may see that this is probably the 
spot where Barak and Deborah met at Mount Tabor 

* This must refer to its base. Burckhardt says, its top is about 
half an hour in circuit. 

f Hasselquist enumerates among the productions of Mount 
Tabor, the oak, the carob-tree, the turpentine-tree, the holly, the 
myrtle, the ivy, oats, onion, artichoke, rue, sage, wormwood, 
saxifrage, (pimpinella officinalis,) poppy, laserwort, &c. He also 
saw there, the rock-goat and the fallow-deer (co-vus dama). 
Burckhardt mentions ounces and wild boars. Van Egmont men- 
tions a tree which he discovered here, whose blossom resembled 
that of the orange-tree, and had the same fragrant smell ; but the 
leaves were something like those of the linden-tree, and the fruit 
is gathered to make rosaries. 

$ Josh. xix. 12 j xxi. 28. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



319 



with their forces, and went to pursue Sisera ; and on 
this account, it might have its name from that great 
prophetess, who then judged and governed Israel ; for 
Josephus relates, that Deborah and Barak gathered 
the army together at this mountain." This point 
Josephus was not required to prove, as the sacred 
history contains explicit information on this head, tc 
which the Jewish historian was incapable of adding a 
single particular. The name of the village seems, 
however, more probably to be derived from the moun- 
tain, than from the prophetess. Deborah, the name 
of the place where she dwelt, and to which the 
children of Israel came up to her for judgment, was 
between Ramah and Bethel in Mount Ephraim,* and 
consequently much further to the south. Whereas in 
Deboura, or Dabour, we have the very Dabor or 
Thaboor of the Scriptures, with only that slight cor- 
ruption which the Hebrew names receive, as pro- 
nounced by the Arabs. The mountain itself they call 
Djebel Tour. 

The legend which assigns this mount as the scene 
of the Transfiguration, has neither probability nor 
antiquity to recommend it, since it cannot be traced 
further back than Jerome, a most suspicious authority. 
It appears, indeed, to have been suggested by a critical 
blunder. We read that our Lord took with him 
Peter, and James, and John, and brought them up 
" into a high mountain apart ;"•]- from which it has 
been sagely inferred, that the mountain spoken of 
could be no other than Tabor, the word 6 apart ' being 
applied to the position of the mountain. " The con- 
clusion," Maundrell remarks, " may possibly be true, 
but the argument used to prove it seems incompetent ; 



* Judges iv. 5. f Matt. xvii. h Mark ix. 2. 



320 



PALESTINE; OR, 



because the term x«t <%'«v^ or apart, most likely relates 
to the withdrawing and retirement of the persons here 
spoken of, and not to the situation of the moun- 
tain." * Of the justness of this remark, no one can 
doubt who is conversant with the original, since the 
same expression occurs repeatedly in the evangelical 
narrative, and in every other instance is understood in 
the sense of privately, or by themselves, -j- Now, for 
the purpose of retirement, Mount Tabor could hardly 
have been chosen by our Lord, as there is reason to 
believe, that it was at the time a fortress of con- 
siderable consequence. In every instance in which 
mention is made of it in history, it is referred to as 
a military post. It was here that Barak encamped 
with ten thousand men, thirteen hundred years before 
the Christian era ; and it was still an important post, 
in the reign of Vespasian. Populous as Galilee was, 
it cannot be imagined that this fertile spot would ever 
be deserted ; and we are told that there was a town 
on the summit. It was at least a fortified place, and 
not very likely, therefore, to have afforded a suitable 
retreat for Peter to build there his three tabernacles. 
The fact that, six days before the Transfiguration, 
our Lord was at Cesarea Philippi, and that after that 
event, he departed from the neighbourhood, and 
" passed through Galilee" to Capernaum, renders it 
probable that the mountain to which our Lord retired, 
was towards the northern confines of the Holy Land. 
But that it was not Mount Tabor, the reader must, 
we think, feel satisfied. 

" From the top of Tabor," says Maundrell, " you 

* xctr /^/(xv, SC. X^iM* in loco private, privatim, seorsim. — 
Schleusner. 

t See Matt. xiv. 13, 23; xvii. 19 ; xx. 17; xxiv. 3. Mark iv, 
34; vi. 31,62. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



321 



have a prospect which, if nothing else, will reward 
the labour of ascending it. It is impossible for man's 
eyes to behold a higher gratification of this nature. 
On the N.W. you discern at a distance the Mediter- 
ranean, and all round yOu have the spacious and 
beautiful plains of Esdraelon and Galilee. Turning 
a little southward, you have in view the high moun- 
tains of Gilboa, fatal to Saul and his sons. Due east 
you discover the Sea of Tiberias, distant about one 
day's journey. A few points to the north appears 
that which they call the Mount of the Beatitudes. 
Not far from this little hill is the city Saphet : it 
stands upon a very eminent and conspicuous mountain, 
and is seen far and near." Beyond this is seen a much 
higher mountain, capped with snow, a part of the 
chain of Antilibanus. To the south-west is Carmel, 
and on the south the hills of Samaria. 

The whole of Mount Tabor, according to Burck- 
hardt, is calcareous. During the greater part of the 
summer, it is covered in the morning with thick 
clouds, which disperse towards mid-day. A strong 
wind blows the whole of the day, and in the night 
dews fall more copious than are usually known in 
Syria. This traveller found on the summit, in 1810, 
a single family of Greek Christians, refugees from 
Ezra in the Haouran, who had retired to this remote 
spot, to avoid paying taxes to the government, and 
expected to remain unnoticed. " They rented the 
upper plain, at the rate of fifty piastres per annum, 
from the Sheikh of Daboury, to which village the 
mountain belongs. The harvest, which they were 
now gathering in, was worth about 1,200 piastres, and 
they had had the good fortune not to be disturbed by 
any tax-gatherers : which would certainly not be the 
case next year, should they remain here." The Khaa 



322 PALESTINE; OR, 

of Djebel Tor is a large ruinous building at no great 
distance from the foot of the mountain, inhabited by 
a few families. It is about three hours and a quarter 
from Tabaria; and a large fair is held here every 
Monday. 

About an hour's distance from the foot of Tabor, 
towards the north-west, on the northern side of the 
plain of Esdraelon, is the village of Eksall, (written 
by Pococke, ZaZ,) supposed, with some probability, to 
be the ancient Xaloth mentioned by Josephus, as one 
of the boundaries of Lower Galilee.* It stands on one 
of those low ridges of rock which are seen here and 
there throughout the plain, and near it are many 
sepulchres cut in the rock : 44 some," says Pococke. 
" are like stone coffins above ground, others are cut 
into the rock like graves, some of them having stone 
covers over them." Mr. Buckingham noticed a 
sarcophagus of rude execution and unusually large 
dimensions. He describes, also, some subterranean 
vaults here, descended to by circular openings like 
the mouths of wells, but which he did not enter. 
44 The most marked feature of the place, however, 
was," he adds, 44 the many graves cut down into 
the rock, exactly in the way in which our modern 
graves are dug in the earth. These were covered 
with rude blocks of stone, sufficiently large to overlap 
the edge of the grave on all sides, and of a height 

* " As for that Galilee which is called the Lower, it extends in 
length from Tiberias to Zabulon, and of the maritime places, 
Ptolemais is its neighbour. Its breadth is from the village called 
Xaloth, which lies in the Great Plain as far as Bersabe. From 
which beginning also is taken the breadth of the Upper Galilee, as 
far as the village Baca, which divides the land of the Tyrians from 
it : its length is also from Meloth to Thella, a village near to Jor- 
dan.".— Wai s, book iii. chap. 6. 



THE HOLY LAND, 



323 



or thickness equal to the depth of the grave itself, 
varying from two to four feet. There were in all, 
perhaps, twenty of these covered sepulchres still per- 
fect ; and in one, whose closing block had been so 
moved aside as to leave an opening through which 
the interior of the grave could be seen, a human skull 
remained perfect." 

ROUTE FROM NAZARETH TO ACRE. 

The whole tract of country between Nazareth and 
the coast was formerly studded with towns and vil- 
lages. Josephus, describing the two G-alilees, says : 
u Their soil is universally rich and fruitful, and full 
of the plantations of trees of all sorts, insomuch that 
it invites the most slothful to take pains in its cul- 
tivation, by its fruitfulness. Accordingly, it is all 
cultivated by its inhabitants, and no part of it lies 
idle. Moreover, the cities lie here very thick ; and the 
very many villages that are here, are every where so 
full of people by the richness of their soil, that the 
very least of them contained above fifteen thousand 
inhabitants." 

About three hours from Nazareth, in the route to 
Acre, is the site of the ancient Sepphoris, described by 
Josephus as the largest city in Galilee, and is built in 
a place by nature so very strong as to command the 
country. The road lies at first in a northerly direc- 
tion, over the hills which encompass the vale of Naza- 
reth on that side ; it then turns to the westward, 
over a hilly and stony tract, full of hard limestones, 
such as are met with in Judea ; and Hasselquist 
noticed the same plants here as in the country about 
Jerusalem.* But at Sepphoury begins what Maun- 

* In particular, Jcali fniticosum. And Dr. Clarke discovered a 
pew species of pink, and some other rare plants. 



324 PALESTINE; OR, 

drell styles " the delicious plain of Zabulon." He 
was an hour and a half in crossing it, which would 
make it, on the usual computation, about four miles 
and a half in length. Hasselquist, however, states it 
to be above three miles long and three quarters broad ; 
while Pococke conjectures it to be ten miles long and 
three miles broad. Dr. Clarke says : " The scenery is 
to the full as delightful as in the rich vales upon the 
south of the Crimea : it reminded us of the finest 
parts of Kent and Surrey. The soil, though stony, 
is exceedingly rich." 

Sapphura, or Sepphoris, (the ancient Zippor, or 
Tsippor,) at one time honoured with the name of 
Diocaesarea, affords another instance of the preserva- 
tion of the more ancient appellation in that by which 
the site is still known to the natives. It is referred 
to in the Talmud as the seat of a Jewish university, 
and was famous for the learning of its rabbies. Jose- 
phus writes it Sepphoris. In the Itinerary of R. Ben- 
jamin, it is said to be twenty miles from Tiberias. 
The miserable village which now occupies the site 
of the ancient city, is called Sephoury. " The re- 
mains of its fortifications," says Dr. Clarke, u ex- 
hibited to us an existing work of Herod, who, after 
its destruction by Varus, not only rebuilt and fortified 
it, but made it the chief city of his tetrarchy," — an 
honour which before was enjoyed by Tiberias. Here 
was held one of the five sanhedrims or judicatures 
of Palestine, the others being at Jerusalem, Jericho, 
G-adara, and Amathus. It was so advantageously 
situated for defence, that it was deemed impregnable ; 
and its inhabitants often revolted against the Romans. 
But when Vespasian was sent into Syria to subdue 
the Jews, the citizens of Sepphoris, sensible of the 
power of the Romans, treated with Cestius Gallus 



THE HOLY LAND. 325 

before Vespasian came, and received a Roman garri- 
son. On the arrival of the general, a deputation met 
him at Ptolemais, and promised to assist him against 
their countrymen; and Vespasian, at their desire, 
left with them as many horsemen and footmen as 
he thought sufficient to oppose the incursions of the 
Jews, if they should come against them.* Medals 
of the city were coined afterwards in the reigns of 
Domitian and Trajan. But what rendered it illus- 
trious in later ages, was its being considered as the 
native place of Joachim and Anna, the parents of the 
Virgin Mary. " Upon the spot where the house of 
Joachim stood, a conspicuous sanctuary," Quaresmius 
states, " built with square stones, was afterwards 
erected. It had two rows of pillars, by which the 
vault of the triple nave was supported. At the upper 
end were three chapels." From a passage in Epi- 
phanius, it appears that its construction was the work 
of one Josephus, a native of Tiberias, who was au- 
thorised by Constantine to erect this and other similar 
edifices in the Holy Land. He built the churches of 
Tiberias, Dioceesarea, and Capernaum, and was raised 
to the rank of count by the emperor. This was to- 
wards the latter end of the life of Constantine, so that 
the church of Sepphoris must have been erected before 
the middle of the fourth century. In the following 
reign, A.D. 339, and the twenty-fifth of Constantius, 
in consequence of a seditious insurrection of the citi- 
zens, the city was destroyed by the Romans, and the 
church appears to have shared in the general desola- 
tion. In the time of the Crusades, the fountain of 
Sepphoury, which is about a mile to the south-east, 

* Joseph. Antiq. bonk xviii. chap. 3 ; xiv. 10. Wars, book iii, 
chap. 2. 

PART II. U 



326 



PALESTINE; OR, 



towards Nazareth, served as a place of rendezvous for 
the armies belonging to the kings of Jerusalem, and 
it is frequently mentioned by William of Tyre. But, 
as no notice is taken by any of the monkish writers 
of the church, it is concluded by Dr. Clarke, that it 
never rose from its ruins. Doubdan, who passed 
through Sepphoury in the middle of the seventeenth 
century, has merely the following reference to it. 
" The town is now a heap of ruins, and upon the 
summit of the mountain, which is not high, is yet 
to be seen the remains of a church built on the spot 
where stood the house of Saint Joachim and Saint 
Anna." Dr. Clarke, from whom we have borrowed 
the greater part of these particulars, gives the follow- 
ing description of this noble ruin. 

" We were conducted to the ruins of a stately 
Gothic edifice, which seems to have been one of the 
finest structures in the Holy Land. Here we entered, 
beneath lofty massive arches of stone. The roof of 
the building was of the same materials. The arches 
are placed at the intersection of a Greek cross, and 
originally supported a dome or tower : their appear- 
ance is highly picturesque, and they exhibit the 
grandeur of a noble style of architecture. Broken 
columns of granite and marble lie scattered among 
the walls. One aisle of this building is yet entire. 
At the eastern extremity, a small temporary altar had 
been recently constructed by the piety of pilgrims : it 
consisted of loose materials, and was of very modern 
date." * The learned traveller had the good fortune 
to find here, and obtain possession of, three ancient 
paintings, exactly resembling, in their style, those 
curious specimens of the art which are found in the 



♦ Travels, Svc. vol. iv. pp. 140, 141. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



327 



churches of Russia, excepting that, instead of Greek, 
they exhibited Arabic inscriptions. They had been 
found by the Arabs in moving a heap of rubbish in 
part of the church. One, which is painted on wood, 
is supposed to represent Christ making himself known 
to the two disciples at Emmaus. The second, which 
is the most ancient, is a picture of the Virgin a T . 
infant J esus. The third has been painted upon an 
Arabic manuscript, which appears to be the leaf of an 
old copy-book, as the same line occurs repeatedly from 
the top to the bottom. The subject of the painting 
is the Virgin and her Son. These tablets are sup- 
posed to have belonged to some church of Malkite 
Greeks, but their antiquity cannot be precisely deter- 
mined. Their being found here would lead one to 
suppose, that the ruined church had at some period 
been converted into a chapel by Greek Christians ; and 
probably the temporary altar was erected by the same 
parties that brought the pictures here. Their pre- 
tensions to be considered as original decorations of the 
church are very equivocal. 

Perhaps, a sufficient reason may be found for the 
neglected and desolate state of this ancient capital of 
Galilee, in its proximity to Nazareth, which, during 
the short-lived kingdom of Jerusalem, became the 
chief city of the district, and was made an archiepis- 
copal see, having under it the bishoprick of Tiberias, 
and the priory of Mount Tabor. And ever since that 
period, Nazareth has been held in the highest estima- 
tion, as, next to the Holy City, the chief resort of 
Christian pilgrims. The jealousy of the monks would 
lead them to regard with no friendly eye a rival esta- 
blishment in their immediate neighbourhood ; and 
thus, Sepphoury appears to have been abandoned by 
the orthodox Latins to the schismatical Greeks. Has- 



328 PALESTINE; OK, 

selquist states, that the modern village was inhabited 
by Greeks. Dr. Clarke, however, says, that they now 
consist principally of Maronites, with a few Drnses. 
Pococke says : " Here the Greeks have a small chapel, 
and there are several broken stone coffins about the 
village. " 

The castle, " once the acropolis of the city," stands 
on the top of the hill nearly half a mile above the 
village, and has an imposing appearance. There is 
a fine tower of hewn stone ; but neither Pococke nor 
Clarke gives any description of it, that might enable 
us to form a conjecture as to its probable date. An 
ancient aqueduct still serves to supply several small 
mills. 

The plain of Zabulon, on which the traveller now 
enters, Pococke says, is called Zaal-hatour. He 
notices a well at the foot of a beautiful hill on the 
left, called by the monks the well of Zabulon. On 
the hill is a village named Bedoui. Van Egmont 
and Heyman notice apparently the same spring, at 
the foot of an eminence on which they observed a 
ruined village about a mile and a half from the hill of 
Sepphoury. Directly opposite to it, they saw, " at 
the foot of a mountain, a walled village called Kaffer 
Mender, defended by several forts." Beyond this, 
the road taken by Pococke leads through " the plea- 
sant narrow vale of Abylene, having low hills on 
each side covered with trees, chiefly the carob-tree 
and a sort of oak with whitish leaves," — to a village 
of the same name, at that time the residence of a 
great sheikh. Two miles further is another well, at 
the foot of a hill, on which is a village called Pere. 
Soon after, the traveller enters upon the plain of Acre. 
To the north of Pere, Pococke was informed that 
there was a village called Damora, which Van Eg- 



THE HOLY LAND. 



329 



mont and Heyman refer to as the residence of a 
sheikh, who had at the time the whole of the sur- 
rounding plain under his jurisdiction, with several 
villages, residing himself " in a very large mansion- 
house." To the south of this is a village which, 
about three months before, the said sheikh had as- 
saulted and plundered, the inhabitants not having 
shewn any great readiness to execute an order he had 
sent them. Its name they write Chafamora. No 
place occurs in Pococke's route, that comes nearer 
this name than Swamor. But D ? Anville notices a 
village, the name of which he writes Shafa Amre, 
which Dr. Clarke supposes to be the Chafamore of 
Van Egmont : he himself writes it Shefhamer and 
Cheffambre. But, it seems, times had changed ; the 
aga of this village appears to have then been the chief 
of the district. It is about seven miles from Sep- 
phoury, and fct stands upon the western declivity of 
a ridge of eminences rising one above another in a 
continuous series, from Libanus to Carmel." We 
look in vain, throughout the accounts respectively 
given by these learned travellers, for any name that 
might seem to indicate the site of the ancient strong 
city of Zabulon, which, Josephus says, was called the 
city of men, and divided the country of Ptolemais 
from their nation. " It was of admirable beauty, 
and had its houses built like those in Tyre, and Sidon, 
and Berytus." But Cestius plundered and set fire 
to it. * MaundrelPs account of his route from Sep- 
phoury to Acre is unusually meagre. " We were an 
hour and a half," he says, " in crossing the plain of 
Zabulon ; and, in an hour and a half more, passed 
by a desolate "village on the right hand, by name 



* Josei faus. Wars, book ii. chap, xviii. 



330 



PALESTINE; OE, 



Satyra. In half an hour more we entered the plains 
of Acre, and in one hour and a half more arrived 
at that place. Our stage this day was somewhat less 
than seven hours (from Nazareth) : it lay about west 
and by north, and through a country very delightful 
and fertile beyond imagination." This, on the usual 
computation of three miles an hour, makes the dis- 
tance from Nazareth to Acre about twenty miles. 

ROUTE FROM TIBERIAS TO DAMASCUS. 

From Acre, there is a route along the coast and 
across the mountains to Damascus ; but, though the 
pashalic of Acre extends as high as Djebail, including 
the mountains inhabited by the Druses, this part of 
the coast was never considered as belonging to the 
kingdom of Israel or the Holy Land. It will, there- 
fore, more properly fall within our notice in the de- 
scription of Syria. 

There is a route from Jerusalem to Damascus on 
either side of the sea of Galilee. From Tiberias, the 
most direct road is that which lies through the ancient 
Saphet, and crosses the Jordan at Jacob's bridge. 
This route has been already described as far as Khan 
Mennye. Pococke, however, seems to have deviated 
further from the line of the lake. Ascending the hill 
to the north of the vale of Hottein, he descended into 
the valley beyond, and came to the place which, he 
says, still bears the name of Baitsida ; he then, by 
the Pass of Doves (Wady Hymam), entered the Vale 
of Gennesareth. " We viewed," he says, " Mag- 
dolum (Medjdel) on the lake, and then went to the 
round fountain, where we reposed awhile, and took 
some refreshment ; and going north, passed by a 
spring called Moriel, and began to ascend the hills 



THE HOLY LAND. 



331 



towards Saphet, which I take to be the eastern end 
of that chain of hills which runs from the sea, north- 
ward of the plain of Acre. There are several summits, 
separated from one another by small valleys. One of 
the first of these is called Rubasy. On the top of the 
northern summit we passed by Aboutbesy : in the 
valley beneath it, is a bridge, called Geser Aboutbesy, 
Here there is a stream which runs to the plain that is 
to the west of the Lake of Tiberias." 

It is difficult to make any thing of these names, 
which appear tc be modern ; but the stream is pro- 
bably that which Burckhardt notices under the name 
of El Eshe, as emptying itself into the lake near Ain 
Tabegha. It was nearly opposite to this spring that 
he descended to the coast from Khan Djob Yousef, the 
Khan of Joseph's Well, which he makes two hours 
and a quarter from Saphet, and one hour and a half 
from the borders of the lake. In the time of Van 
Egmont and Heyman, this khan was called the Khan 
of Cuperli, " from its being built, together with seve- 
ral other structures of the same kind in Turkey, by 
a grand-vizier of that name." They make it less 
than an hour from the point at which they began to 
ascend the mountains by a very troublesome road, and 
describe it as " an excellent baiting-place both for 
man and beast." 66 The khan has on the outside the 
appearance of a castle. You enter through a large 
gate into a spacious area, round which are arched 
piazzas serving for stables, and over them apartments 
with terraces : near it is a mosque with a minaret, 
and a large cistern, generally full of rain-water ; but, 
at the time we visited the khan, it was dry. On the 
left side of this khan is also a small mosque, and a 
pit covered with a cupola. The Turks will have this 
to be the pit into which Joseph was thrown, before 



332 



PALESTINE ; OK, 



his brethren sold him to the Ishmaelites ; but it is at 
present no more than six spans in depth. Besides, 
the Scripture represents the pit into which Joseph 
was cast, as dry, whereas this contained very clear and 
good water." 

At the time of Burckhardt's visit, the khan was 
falling rapidly into ruin. It was then inhabited by 
a dozen Moggrebin soldiers with their families, who 
cultivate the fields near it. " Joseph's Well" is, 
he says, held in veneration by Turks as well as 
Christians : the former have a small chapel just by 
it, and caravan travellers seldom pass here without 
saying a few prayers in honour of Yousef. He de- 
scribes it as about three feet in diameter, and at least 
thirty feet in depth; which so ill accords with the 
statement given by Van Egmont, that it is hard to 
imagine that they were shewn the same well. But 
it matters little : any well would equally answer the 
purpose of the legend. Burckhardt avows his scepti- 
cism on the point. " I was told, 51 he says, " that 
the bottom is hewn in the rock : its sides were well 
lined with masonry as far as I could see into it, and 
the water never dries up ; a circumstance which 
makes it difficult to believe that this was the well 
into which Joseph was thrown." That which was 
shewn to Pococke as Djob Yousef, he describes as 
" a cistern under ground." The whole of the moun- 
tain in the vicinity is covered with large pieces of 
black stone ; but the main body of the rock is cal- 
careous. " The country people relate, that the tears 
of Jacob, dropping upon the ground while he was in 
search of his son, turned the white stones black, and 
they in consequence call these stones Jacob's tears." 

There is no good reason to suppose that Dothan, 
whither Joseph came in search of his brethren, was 



I 

THE HOLY LAND. 333 

so far north of Shechem as this part of Galilee. " It 
is a long way from Hebron," Dr. Richardson justly 
remarks, " for the sons of Jacob to go to feed their 
herds, and a still further way for a solitary youth like 
Joseph to be sent by his father in quest of them. 
This pit is nearly the same distance from Shechem, 
that Shechem is from Hebron ; namely, about two 
days and a half, or three days' journey." The pit 
in question, the learned traveller believes, derives its 
name from a chief of Saracenic celebrity. Thus, there 
is a " Joseph's Hall" at Cairo, which has been igno- 
rantly supposed to owe its name to the patriarch, 
although, in fact, the work of a Mameluke chieftain. 
Dr. Pococke accounts for the blunder respecting Djoh 
Yousef) by supposing it to have originated in the 
mistaken notion that Saphet is the ancient Bethulia. 
The latter he considers to be no other place, in fact, 
than Bethel. The real Doth an, he remarks, " could 
not be a great way from Bethulia, because Holofernes's 
army extended from Bethulia to Dothan ; and though 
this place might anciently have been called Dothan, as 
it is at present by the J ews, yet its great distance 
from Shechem makes it unlikely to be the place where 
Joseph went to his brethren, as it is the distance of 
two or three ordinary days' journey, and could not be 
performed in less than five or six days with the cattle 
which they were charged to feed." The district is 
called by the natives Koua-el-Kerd, and, a little lower 
down, Redjel-el-Kaa, neither of which names presents 
any affinity to Dothan. The whole legend may, 
therefore, be safely dismissed as another of those igno- 
rant fictions which have perplexed the geography of 
the Holy Land.* 

• Dr. Richardson arrived at Djob Yousef (Gib Yousouff, Jeb 
Joseph?) from Nazareth, About four hours after turning out of 
u 2 



334 



PALESTINE; OK, 



Saphet, by Burckhardt written Szaffad, has already 
been referred to as one of the four holy cities of the 
Talmud. Its situation is very high, and commands 
the whole country round. It is described by Burck- 
hardt as a neatly-built town, standing upon several 
low hills, which divide it into different quarters : of 
these, the largest is inhabited exclusively by Jews, 
who esteem Szaffad a sacred place. " The whole may 
contain 600 houses, of which 150 belong to the Jews, 
and from 80 to 100 to the Christians. The town is 
governed by a Mutsellim, whose district comprises 
about a dozen villages. The garrison consists of 
Moggrebins, the greater part of whom have married 
here, and cultivate a part of the neighbouring lands. 
The town is surrounded with olive-plantations and 
vineyards, but the principal occupations of the in- 
habitants are indigo -dyeing and the manufacture of 
cotton cloth. On every Friday a market is held, 
to which all the peasants of the neighbourhood re- 
sort." 

The summit of the hill, round the foot of which 
Szaffad may be said to lie, is crowned with an ancient 
castle, part of which, Pococke says, the Jews think 
to be as old as the time of their prosperity. TThen 
he visited it, there were only great ruins : he notices 
particularly 44 two fine, large, round towers that be. 
longed to it." The Christians had possession of the 

the road to Tiberias, he came to a large village on the side of a 
hill, called Megdra, and a little further on, another village called 
Mensura. In Pococke's route to Saphet, occur the names of Akeby, 
near which are grottoes cut in several parts of the perpendicular 
rocks; Cesy; Adborow ; and Wady Lakab. Also, a little to the 
north of Djob Yousef, a place called Renety. Future travellers 
may throw light on these names, which are apparently allied to 
nothing ancient or intelligible. 



t 



THE HOLY LAND. 



335 



fortress in the time of the Crusades ; and " I saw," 
he adds, u on a building in the town, a relief of the 
arms of the knights of St. J ohn of J erusalem : it was 
surrendered by them to Saladin, sultan of Egypt.* 
The town is a little lower down, on three sides of the 
hill on which the castle stands : it is a considerable 
town, having been formerly the place of residence of 
the pasha of this country, on which account it was 
called the pashalic of Saphet ; and the whole territory 
now goes by the name of the country of Saphet, but 
the pasha resides at Sidon, and a cadi from Constanti- 

* Brocardus mentions Saphet in the following words: " Sa- 
phet, or Sephet, is a city or castle, formerly belonging to the 
knights-templars. The castle is handsome, very strong, and situ- 
ated on a mountain of extraordinary height, but was taken by the 
Soldan, and, to the great detriment of the Christians, still con- 
tinues in his possession, as he by this means keeps in subjection 
all Galilee; that is, the tribes of Zebulon, Naphthali, Asher, 
Issachar, Manasseh, and the whole country as far as Tyre and 
Sidon." Another writer of the middle ages states, that Cora- 
dine, prince of Damascus, built at Saphet a very strong castle, 
which Saladin, the scourge of the Christians, reduced by a long 
siege to such extremities, that the besieged, pressed by famine, 
and having obtained leave of the grand-master of the knights- 
templars, surrendered to that tyrant. In the year 1239, Benedict, 
bishop of Marseilles, having made a voyage to the Holy Land, 
encouraged the templars to rebuild the castle of Saphet: he is 
said to have laid the first stone himself, and to have animated 
the workmen by a spirited oration. He then returned to his 
native land, and at his death bequeathed to this castle, " as to 
his beloved son," his whole fortune and his blessing. In 1266, 
this castle again fell into the hands of the Infidels, through the 
treachery of its commander, one Leo, a Syrian knight, who had 
embraced the Mahommedan religion. The whole garrison, to- 
gether with the inhabitants, amounting to three thousand, are 
said to have been formally beheaded by the Infidels, in violation 
of their promise, given upon oath, that they should enjoy their 
lives and liberties. See Van Egmont and Heyman's Travels, 
vol. ii. p. 43. 



336 



PALESTINE; OR, 



nople lives here.* There are many Jews in. this 
place, it being a sort of university for the education 
of their rabbies, of whom there are about twenty or 
thirty here, and some of them come as far as from 
Poland. They have no less than seven synagogues. 
Several doctors of their law, who lived in the time 
of the second Temple, are said to be buried here, 
three of whom lie in a place which is now turned 
into a mosque ; and the Turks say., they are three of 
the sons of Jacob. The Jews have a notion, that the 
Messiah will reign here forty years before he will 
take up his residence in Jerusalem. To the north of 
the hill on which the castle stands, there are several 
wells, which, they say, Isaac dug, and about which 
there were such contentions between the herdsmen 
of Isaac and Gerar ; but they have much mistaken 
the place, the Valley of Gerar, in which they were 
dug, being at a great distance on the other side of 
Jerusalem." 

Thus far Pococke. Turks, Jews, and Christians 
seem, in this land of legends, to rival each other in 
ignorant credulity. Van Egmont and Heyman de- 
scribe " a cave at Saphet, held in great veneration 
by the Turks, who call it Jacob's Cave, pretending 
that the patriarch and his family lived there when he 
received the account of his son Joseph's death; which, 
according to th^m, he lamented with such floods of 
tears as to wash holes in the rocks. No Jew is suf- 
fered to approach this sacred cave ; and it is with 
great difficulty that Christians, here called Nazareens, 
can obtain this favour. It is situated in a small hill 
or eminence within the town itself, and to which you 

* 'fhis was in 1737- The pashalic of Sidon and that of Acre are 
the same, and Saphet is included in it.^ 



THE HOLY LAND. 



337 



ascend by steps terminating in a small garden planted 
with trees, under whose shadow is a Turkish oratory. 
Here are also several sepulchres ; and, in the front of 
the oratory, is a cave hewn out of the rock, containing 
eleven or twelve grottoes, situated in two rows over 
each other, and in which, as they pretend, Jacob and 
his family lived. But that belonging to Jacob him- 
self, is as large again as any of the others. We also 
saw here a large tomb, covered with silks of several 
colours, and containing, according to the Turks, the 
body of Judah. The whole is inclosed with a wall, 
and near it, in a small house, lives a Turkish san- 
ton." 

There can be little doubt that these grottoes are 
sepulchral, and that they are of high antiquity, al- 
though it is impossible now to ascertain who were 
the original tenants or proprietors. — " The next 
place," continue the same travellers, " that engaged 
our attention, was the citadel, which is the greatest 
object of curiosity in Saphet, and generally considered 
as one of the most ancient structures remaining in 
this country ; though, at present, it is in so ruinous 
a condition, that its ancient figure can scarcely be 
determined. It stands on the summit of a mountain 
round which the city is built, and was formerly a 
very strong fortification ; as sufficiently appears from 
the multitude of ruins and the largeness of its circuit, 
which extends near a mile and a half. In order to 
form some idea of this fortification in its present 
state, imagine a lofty mountain, and on its summit 
-a round castle with walls of an incredible thickness, 
with a corridor or covered passage extending round 
the walls, and ascended by a winding staircase. The 
thickness of the wall and the corridor together was 
twenty paces. The whole was of hewn stone, and some 



338 



PALESTINE; OR, 



of the stones are eight or nine spans in length. The 
inner part of the castle was in some measure entire, 
and consisted of an hexagonical room, the terrace 
roof of which is supported by six arches, and lighted 
from an opening in the roof. Near this castle we 
also saw the ruins of several cisterns and other build- 
ings, but now hardly distinguishable. This castle 
was anciently surrounded with stupendous works, as 
appears from the remains of two moats lined with 
free-stone, several fragments of walls, bulwarks, 
towers, &c, all very solid and strongly built, and 
below these moats, other massive works having corri- 
dors round them in the same manner as the castle : 
so that any person, on surveying these fortifications, 
may wonder how so strong a fortress could ever be 
taken. Tradition tells us, that the castle of Saphet 
was taken by stratagem, a number of camels being 
sent, as the besieged imagined, with provision, but 
which were in reality loaded with soldiers. 

** But what best merits the greatest attention of 
the traveller, is a large structure of free-stone in the 
form of a cupola or dome. The stones, which are 
almost white, are of astonishing magnitude, some 
being twelve spans in length, and five in thickness. 
The inside is full of niches for placing statues, and 
near each is a small cell. An open colonnade extends 
quite round the building, and, like the rest of the 
structure, is very massive and compact. We ascended 
to the top of the dome, and there found some traces 
of another building which had been erected on it. 
From here we had the finest prospect that can be 
imagined, extending over the city of Saphet and the 
circumjacent places, which are very numerous, all 
the sides of the mountains being full of villages and 
hamlets, supposed once to have made a part of the 



THE HOLY LAND. 



339 



city of Saphet, which is at present almost in ruins 
and every where without walls. But what greatly 
increases the beauty of the prospect, is, that the 
adjacent country is every where well cultivated. 
Towards the south is a most enchanting prospect over 
the Lake of Tiberias. We even imagined we could 
here see the extremity of it, and distinguish the place 
where the Jordan issues from it ; we had also a 
sight of Mount Tabor, the mountains of Carmel and 
Lebanon, together with the large plain of Esdraelon, 
the prospect being terminated with the mountains 
which bound that plain. But, if the prospect over 
the Lake of Tiberias be pleasant, it is also very 
illusive : the water appears not to be a mile distant ; 
but a traveller will find it difficult to reach the banks 
in four hours. There is the same deceptio visits with 
regard to the village called Hattin (Hottein), situated 
between Saphet and Mount Tabor, and where is 
shewn with great confidence the grave of Moses's 
father-in-law. It appears to be hardly a stone's cast, 
and yet the real distance is three long hours. 

u In our descent from the castle, we saw ruins in 
almost every place, and the vestiges of the labour of 
some who had been seeking for treasures. We also 
saw that this part of the mountain was covered with 
vineyards, producing a very beautiful, delicious grape ; 
and accordingly, the wine nf Saphet is good, but 
would be excellent, did the Jews, who are the makers 
of it, understand their business. The air of Saphet, 
from its high situation, is very pure and healthy, 
and at the same time so fresh and cool, that the 
heats, which, during the summer, are very great in 
the adjacent country, are here hardly felt, a gentle 
breeze continually refreshing the air. And this was 
the reason why anciently the royal children were 



340 



PALESTINE; OK, 



often sent from Damascus hither, especially in sum- 
mer, or when indisposed. The fruits also are remark- 
ably good, especially the grapes and figs. Here are 
also great numbers of lemon-trees ; for, at the foot 
of the mountains are several fertile valleys laid out 
into gardens ; and the whole country is naturally 
fertile, and abounds with springs. Here is also a 
large aqueduct, which conveys the rain water from 
one place to another." 

Saphet had, at that period, no Christian families, 
which is mentioned by these travellers as remarkable. 
There were a few Moors, but of J ews great numbers 5 
and they were assured that, about a century before, 
the number of Jews settled here was not less than 
12,000. The town was now no more than a village 
in the midst of ruins. " Were it not," they say, 
u for the passionate desire of the Jews for ending 
their days here, it would long since have been utterly* 
forsaken. For it has been so often taken and retaken 
by Christians and Mahommedans, that it now appears 
only as one confused heap, having nothing venerable 
in it, except its name, situation, and a few ruined 
structures. The Jews are indeed possessed with an 
irresistible desire, or rather frenzy, for dying in this 
place, relinquishing every thing for this. They ex- 
press a high veneration for Jerusalem and Hebron, 
but not to be compared jWith this ; which they found 
on the following reasons. First : a great number of 
their most celebrated rabbins and other holy men 
have died, and lie buried here, whose sepulchres they 
visit with the greatest devotion; particularly those 
of the rabbins, Simon Ben Juchan, author of the 
Zohar ; Hillel, writer of the Thana on the Gamara ; 
Samai Hagadol ; and Jehuda Bar Elei, who also 
wrote on the Gamara. Secondly : they are persuaded 



THE HOLY XAKD. 



341 



by their rabbins, that the Messiah, who is to be born 
in Galilee, will make Saphet the capital of his new 
kingdom to be erected here on earth, and that those 
who shall dwell there in those glorious times, may 
expect very singular favours from him. In short, 
the heads of their rabbins are filled with such a heap 
of reveries and fantastical visions, that the poor Jews, 
who adopt the notions of their teachers, seem to have 
abandoned all reason. They still expect the Messiah, 
though it is now above seventeen hundred years since 
they crucified him, and all the prophecies relating to 
him have been accomplished. And this is the reason 
that they are always at a loss for an answer, when 
closely pressed, with regard to these prophecies ; so 
that their devotions are mere superstition, prompting 
them to prefer this place to another, though they 
live in the greatest misery, merely to leave their 
remains in Saphet. The Turks are not backward to 
take advantage of this superstitious notion of the 
J ews ; for, first, they make them dearly purchase 
the favour of living at Saphet, and, by a variety of 
oppressions, fines, and the like unjust practices, 
squeeze them to such a degree, that they may be said 
to pay for the very air they breathe. And if any, 
through extreme poverty, are obliged to retire, the 
pasha is no loser, as his quota must be made up by 
the others. It is sometimes pretended that he carried 
considerable treasures away with him : and the pasha 
immediately demands, in the name of the Grand 
Signior, that the treasures be delivered up ; he settles 
the sum at his pleasure, and forces these miserable 
people to pay it, who here lead the poorest and most 
deplorable life that can be conceived. Their only 
consolation is, their having synagogues, of which, 
when we visited Saphet, there were seven, though 



342 PALESTINE; OR, 

formerly they amounted to thirty or more ; and that 
they are at liberty to pray in them, and attend to 
the visionary harangues of their rabbins. They, 
however, send from Saphet some of their rabbins of 
the greatest learning and integrity, to Constantinople, 
Smyrna, and other trading cities of the Ottoman 
empire where wealthy Jews reside ; and some of them 
even visit Germany, Holland, England, and other 
places not subject to the Inquisition ; collecting by 
this means considerable sums, to be distributed among 
the Jews at Jerusalem, Hebron, and Saphet, though 
the greatest share always falls to the latter.* They 
have still here a printing-house and a kind of Univer- 
sity, where the Jewish youths are instructed in their 
learning, which consists wholly in the Hebrew lan- 
guage and understanding the Talmud. The Jews 
here are descended from the tribe of Judah, but their 
ancestors are natives of Spain, and accordingly, they 
all speak the Spanish language perfectly well." 

To the above-mentioned reasons for venerating this 
favoured site, the inhabitants are stated to add another, 
which, if it rested on any authentic tradition, would 
sufficiently explain, without the help of Jacob's cave 
or any other legend, the ancient fame and sanctity 
attaching to it. They pretend that it was the birth- 
place of Queen Esther. It makes somewhat against 
this claim, however, that the daughter of Abihail was 
of the tribe of Benjamin, and probably born within 
the kingdom of Judah, as her uncle was among those 
who had been carried away captive by the King of 
Babylon from Jerusalem. The Jews of Saphet stated, 

* Tiberias is not mentioned : and, at this period, few Jews re- 
sided there. The account in other respects exactly agrees with the 
statement of Burckhardt, given in the description of Tabaria, and 
serves to corroborate its truth. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



343 



that this is the town called in the hook of Joshua, 
Orinah. No mention is made of Saphet in the English 
Bible ; but, in the apocryphal book of Tobit, accord- 
ing to the Vulgate, Tobias is said to be " of the tribe 
and city of Naphthali, in the upper parts of Galilee, 
beyond the road that leads to the west, having on the 
left the city of Saphet." (Tobit LI.) The city of 
Naphthali was a mile to the south of it. Since then, 
its name appears only in the annals of the Crusades. 
It was doomed, however, to suffer severely from the 
French invasion. In 1799, the French had occupied 
Szaffad with a garrison of four hundred men, their 
outposts being advanced as far as the bridge of Beni 
Yacoub. After their retreat from Akka (Acre), 
the Turks wreaked their vengeance on the Jews, 
whose quarter of the town they completely sacked. 
The castle, Burckhardt says, appears to have under- 
gone a thorough repair in the course of the last cen- 
tury. There is also, he says, another but smaller 
castle, of modern date, with half-ruined walls, at the 
foot of the hill. Captain Mangles was struck with 
the extreme beauty of the situation. The approach 
from the north, he describes as very fine : the country 
abounds in olives, vines, and almond -trees, which 
were then (May 26) in blossom. He represents the 
castle as occupying a small hill standing by itself, and 
the town as appearing to consist of four distinct vil- 
lages at the foot of it. It must have increased con- 
siderably in extent, if this be correct, since the middle 
of the last century.* It is only within that period 

* Volney attributes the decline of Saphet to the earthquake of 
759. " The Jews," he says, " who believe that the Messiah will 
establish the seat of his empire at Safad, had formed an affection 
for this place, and had a93cmbled here to the number of fifty or sixty 



344 PALESTINE; OR, 

that it has received a proportion of Christians. The 
Jews do not seem to have become much more nume- 
rous, owing, perhaps, to the extreme intolerance of 
the Turks, added to the superior advantages and equal 
sanctity of Tabaria. 

From Szaffad, the road ascends, passing over the 
summit of Djebel Szaffad, which Burckhardt states 
to be a southern branch of the Djebel el Sheikh or 
Antilibanus. This chain begins on the N.W. side of 
Lake Houle. The whole is calcareous, with very 
little basalt or tufwacke. After passing the highest 
point, the road descends through a narrow valley 
called Akabet Feraein, and passes by the spring of 
Feraein. On the right, the traveller passes the village 
Feraab. At the foot of the mountain is a plain called 
Ard Aaseifera, a small part of which is cultivated by 
the inhabitants of Szaffad ; there are several springs 
in it. From this plain the road descends the western 
banks of the valley of the Jordan, to Djissr (or Djeser) 
Beni Ydkoub, which Burckhardt makes two hours and 
three quarters from the summit of Djebel Szaffad. This 
bridge connects the pashalics of Damascus and Acre ; 
and here the Pasha of Damascus keeps a few men, 
chiefly for the purpose of collecting the ghaffer, or toll, 
paid by all Christians who cross it. The ordinary 
toll is about nine -pence a head, but the pilgrims who 

families. But the earthquake of 1759 destroyed all ; and Safad, 
looked upon by the Turks with a jealous eye, (regarde de mauvais 
ceil) is now but a village almost deserted." It was the cradle of the 
power of the celebrated Sheikh Daher, mentioned at p. 2/1, of 
whom the French traveller has given so interesting an account. 
From 1750 to 1776, he commanded the greater part of the pashalic 
of Acre, assuming the title of " Sheikh of Acre, prince of princes, 
commander ot Nazareth, Tiberias, and Saphet, and sheikh of all 
Galilee." Djezzar Pasha succeeded him as Pasha of Acre. 



THE HOLY" LAXD. 



345 



pass here on their way to Jerusalem, before Easter, 
pay seven shillings. The river is here about thirty- 
live paces in width. On the west side is a guard- 
house belonging to the Pasha of Acre. On the other 
side is a khan much frequented by travellers, which 
was almost entirely demolished when the French 
invaded Syria. It encloses a spring, and in the middle 
of it are ruins of an ancient square building, con- 
structed (Burckhardt says) of basalt, with which the 
mountains abound, and having columns in its four 
angles. This may possibly be the remains of a fortress 
built near this spot by Baldwin, fourth king of Jeru- 
salem. The bridge itself is of a solid construction, 
with four arches.* Its name is of course said to com- 
memorate the passage of the patriarch Jacob, on his 
return from Padan-Aram. The legend does not, in- 
deed, as might be expected, attribute the construction 
of it to his architectural skill. If the name, however, 
be correctly given, it signifies " the bridge of the sons 
of Jacob ;" referring, probably, to some Arab tribe 
who occupied this district. Thus, there are the tribes 
of Beni Szakher, Beni Obeid, Beni Djohma, &c. A 
short mile below the bridge, Pococke mentions an 
oblong mount, apparently artificial, round the summit 
of which are the foundations of a strong wall. " At 
the south end, and on the east side, I saw the remains 
of two very handsome gates of hewn stone, with 
round turrets at the corners. At the north end, 
there is a great heap of ruins, probably of a castle. 
The whole is about half a mile in circumference. 
There are some signs of suburbs to the south, on a 
lower ground, which seems to have been fortified. 
The place is now Kaisar-Aterah, or Geser-Aterah, and 



* According to Burckhardt : Pococke says, three arches. 



346 



PALESTINE; OK, 



it seems to have been an improvement of the Romans. 
A mile above the bridge, there is a mineral water, 
which seemed to be of sulphur and iron : it is walled 
in, as if it had been formerly frequented. About half 
way between this place and the Lake Samachonitis, 
is a little hill with ruins on it, which they now call 
the town of Jacob." * 

From Djeser Beni Yakoub, Pococke makes it but 
a mile and a half (Burckhardt about three quarters 
of an hour) to this lake, which is called in the Scrip- 
tures u the waters of Merom," and now bears the 
name of Bahr-el-Houly (Lake Julias). According to 
Josephus, this lake was seven miles long; but it is 
not, our modern authorities state, above two miles 
broad, except at tho north end, where it may be about 
four. The banks are very low, the hills not approach- 
ing it in any part. It is, however, on a level consi- 
derably higher than Lake Tabaria. The south-west 
shore bears the name ©f Melaha^ from the ground 
being covered with a saline crust. The fisheries of 
the lake are rented of the Mutsellim of Szaffad, by 
some fishermen of that town. It is inhabited, Burck- 
hardt says, only on the eastern borders, where we find 
the villages Eddeir and Esseira, and between them a 
ruined place called Kherbet Eddaherye. " The 
waters are muddy, and esteemed unwholesome, having 
something of the nature of the waters of a morass, 

* Pococke's Travels, book i. chap. 18. Dr. Richardson mentions 
another small lake, between this and Lake Tabaria, a little below 
Jacob's Bridge, which, " at first sight, appeared to be a continu- 
ation of the Lake of Gennesareth ; but, when we obtained a view 
of it from higher ground, we were satisfied," he says, " that it was 
not. In some of the maps, it is marked as the Lake Semechonitis 
of Josephus, and the description is in some respects applicable to 
it ; but then it must not be considered as synonymous with the 
Bahr-el-Hoolya. n 



THE HOLY LAND. 



347 



which is partly caused by their stepping the brooks 
on the west side in order to water the country, so 
that the water passes through the earth into this 
lake ; it is also in some measure owing to the mud- 
diness of its bed. After the snows are melted, and 
the waters fallen, it is only a marsh through which 
the Jordan runs. The waters, by passing through 
the rocky bed towards the sea of Tiberias, settle, 
purify, and become very wholesome." Such is Po- 
cocke's account. Seetzen says, that its shores are 
frequented by a great number of wild boars, who 
conceal themselves in the rushes and reeds which 
surround it. Captain Mangles describes the plain 
on the north as literally covered with wild geese, 
ducks, widgeon, snipe, and other water-fowl of every 
description. He found the country beyond the lake 
full of marshes and swamps, so as to endanger in 
some instances the horses, and intersected with nume- 
rous streams. 

Between three and four hours from Jacob's Bridge, 
the route taken by Dr. Richardson led to a mill and 
soap-manufactory, situated at the source of a large 
stream, nearly as broad, but not so deep, as the 
Jordan: it is called Geersh. The houses of the 
village here were observed to be 66 pavilion -roofed, not 
fiat, as in Egypt and Palestine : the inhabitants 
seemed a licentious, disorderly people." About a mile 
further, through rich cultivated fields, they passed the 
top of another large stream, and pitched their tents 
On a sloping bank near the village of Yallahe, the 
second night after leaving Nazareth. <6 This seemed," 
he says, " to be only a temporary village. The 
houses were constructed of bundles of reeds tied 
together ; and it was probably only a summer resi- 



348 



PALESTINE; OE, 



dence, for, during the rainy season, the greater 
part of the plain would be inundated. Fine herds 
of black cattle were feeding around. " The next 
day, they proceeded along the edge of a watery plain, 
intersected with numberless ditches and streamlets, 
and overrun with gigantic thistles, which reached 
to their saddles, and annoyed them excessively. The 
common track avoids them. High mountains here 
bound the vale of the Jordan on either side, while 
" the loftier Busia unites them at its termination, 
looking from his throne, the snow-crowned monarch 
of the vale." 

Having cleared the plain, they got upon higher 
ground, and came to another village of reed-huts, 
like Yallahe. A little higher up, they crossed a stone 
bridge of five arches, thrown over a considerable 
river, which brawls its way over a rough and stony 
bed, down to Lake Houle. A well-cut stone, bearing 
an Arabic inscription, which had belonged to the 
bridge, lay on the bank. After crossing the bridge, 
they descended in a southerly direction, crossed 
another stream, and came to a mount named Til-el- 
K attire* From the top of this delightful elevation, 
to which they ascended by a well-formed road, they 
enjoyed an extensive view of the whole of the Bahr- 
el-Hoolya, spreading along its base towards the south, 
with the meadowy plain intersected by the mountain 
rivulets, and the moimtains by which it is bounded. 
Djebel Sheikh, capped with snow, was seen over- 
topping the whole range on the north. The traces 
of former improvement shewed that art had once lent 
its aid to improve the natural capabilities of this 
situation. Four stone huts, flat-roofed, were now all 
that occupied the mound ; the winder residence of 



THE HOLY LAND. 



349 



some native families who were then, enjoying them- 
selves in their tents. Hard hy the stream which 
flows at the foot, was a sheikh's tomb, under the 
shade of a stately oak, whose branches were hung 
with votive rags and strings ; and some lately-burned 
ashes lay on the tomb itself. A grove of venerable 
oaks here yields the traveller a most welcome shade. 
He is still within the pashalic of Acre. 

The route taken by Dr. Richardson now lay west- 
ward, through a fine undulating plain, partially cul- 
tivated, and enlivened with trees, but almost without 
inhabitants. After crossing the mountain range on 
the left of the Jordan, they traversed another valley, 
and another mountain, from which they descended 
into the beautiful vale of Hasbeia. This is the name 
of a considerable tract lying to the west of Djebel 
Sheikh, chiefly inhabited by Druses. The town of 
this name is situated on the top of a high hill, and 
may contain, Burckhardt says, seven hundred houses, 
half of which belong to Druse families ; the rest, with 
the exception of about forty Turkish families and 
twenty Enzairie, to Christians : these are principally 
Greeks, but there are also Catholics and Maronites. 
The inhabitants make cotton cloth for shirts and 
gowns, and have a few dyeing -houses. The chief 
production of the soil is olives. The chief of the 
town is an emir of the Druses, dependent both on the 
Emir Beshir and the Pasha of Damascus. He lives 
in a well-built serai, which in time of war might 
serve as a castle. 66 The neighbourhood of Hasbeia," 
Burckhardt states, " is interesting to the mineralo- 
gist. I was told by the Greek priest," (with whom 
he lodged,) " that a metal was found near it, of which 
nobody knew the name, nor made any use. Having 

FART II, X 



350 PALESTINE; OR, 

procured a labourer, I found, after digging in the 
wady a few hundred paces to the E. of the village, 
several small pieces of a metallic substance, which I 
took to be a native amalgam of mercury. According 
to the description given me, cinnabar is also found 
here, but we could discover no specimen of it after 
half an hour's digging. The ground all around and 
the spring near the village are strongly impregnated 
with iron. The rock is sandstone, of a dark red 
colour." Seetzen says, " The mountains of the neigh- 
bourhood are for the most part calcareous, and in the 
bottom of the hills are seen strata of trap. The 
object the most remarkable in the mineralogy of the 
district, is a mine of asphaltos at the distance of a 
league W.S.W. of Hasbeia." Burckhardt refers to 
this " mine," which, he says, is situated upon the 
declivity of a chalky hill in the wady, at one hour 
below the village on the west side. He calls it bitu- 
men Judaicum: by the natives it is called hommar, 
and the mine, Biar el hommar. The bitumen is found 
in large veins at about twenty feet below the surface ; 
the pits are from six to twelve feet in diameter. The 
workmen descend by a rope and wheel, and, in hewing 
out the bitumen, they leave columns of that substance 
at different intervals as a support to the earth above. 
There are upwards of twenty-five of these pits or 
wells, but the greater part of them are abandoned, or 
overgrown with shrubs. Burchkardt saw only one 
that appeared to have been recently worked, and says, 
they work only during the summer months. The 
Emir possesses the monopoly of the bitumen : he alone 
works the pits, and sells the produce to the merchants 
of Damascus, Beirout, and Aleppo. It was now at 
about twopence halfpenny the pound. Seetzen says, 



THE HOLY LAND. 351 

that the greater part is transported to Europe, but 
that it is used by the natives to secure the vines from 
insects. * 

What Dr. Richardson calls the Vale of Hasbeia, 
is the wady watered by the moiet-Hasbeia, by Seetzen 
called the Hasberia, the principal source of which is 
a large spring that wells out from under the west 
side of Djebel Sheikh, and is said to run into the 
Bahr-el-Hoolya. The banks of the river are covered 
with numerous plantations of mulberry-trees, well 
cut and watered, and in the highest order ; and 
throughout the vale, the silk- worm is " successfully 
cultivated." 

The traveller has now entered the pashalic of Da- 
mascus ; but the chief power belongs to the prince 
of the Druses, and there are few Turks in the country. 
A stony and barren track succeeds, hilly, with 
patches of cultivation and but thinly peopled ; the soil 
limestone and a large -grained conglomerate. On the 
top of a hill to the right, stands the Christian village 
of Reshia. About three quarters of an hour further, 
on the left, the village of Firkook, separated from the 
road by a deep ravine, through which flows a rivulet. 
The houses are high, and have a comfortable appear- 
ance, rising in terraces on the slope of the hill. 
" From Firkook," continues Dr. Richardson, u the 
scenery continued of nearly the same description., — i 
ragged columnar masses of rock, mixed with the 
lugubrious cypress and dwarf cedar, all the way to 

* Burckhardt enumerates the following villages as belonging 
to the territory of Hasbeia ; Ain Sharafe, El Kefeir, Am Annia, 
Shoueia, Ain Tinte, El Kankabe, El Heberie, Rasheyat-el-Fukhar, 
Ferdis, Khereibe, El Merie, Shiba, Banias, Ain Fid, Zoura, Ain 
Kamed Banias, Djoubeta, Fershouba, Kefaer Hamam, El Waesh- 
dal, El Zouye, 



352 PALESTINE; OR, 

Rahlee, which is four miles from Reshia. * Here we 
found the ruins of an ancient temple ; a small edifice 
built of large stones, and partially ornamented with 
sculpture, apparently of Roman workmanship, and 
much disintegrated. On the opposite of the road, 
there are many stone pots, and some remarkably fine 
walnut-trees. Higher up the bank are the remains of 
another edifice, which is called the palace." They 
could obtain no account of the history of this place. 
About two hours further, descending a steep hill, 
they issued from the mountain defiles upon a stony, 
uncultivated plain. Three more hours brought them 
to Katori) a substantial village built with stone, and 
containing many houses of two and three stories. 
Beyond this, the soil improves. The plain is remark- 
ably flat, extensive, and intersected in all directions 
by small streams. Not an enclosure is to be seen ; 
but it was covered at this time with crops of wheat 
and barley, beyond which was seen a wood. The road 
is a narrow, regular, well-worn track, resembling a 
cross-road in this country. Five hours from Katon, it 

* Seetzen noticed ruins of a Roman temple, consisting of a 
single column of the peristyle of the Ionic order, of the best 
execution, at a village called Asha, inhabited by Druses and 
Greek Christians, at about a day's journey from Rasheia. The 
latter village he states to be the residence of an emir, whose au- 
thority extends over twenty other villages ; it is situated on the 
steep declivity of a mountain, about two days from Damascus. 
Hasbeia, he makes five leagues to the south of Rasheia, and says, 
it is somewhat larger, and, like it, situated on the steep descent 
of a mountain. Here he alighted at the house of the learned 
Greek Bishop of Star (Tyre), or Seide (Sidon), to whom he had a 
letter of recommendation. The two districts of Rasheia and 
Hasbeia are stated to be the least known of all Syria. — See 
" Brief Account of the Countries adjoining the Lake of Tiberias, 
&c. by M. Seetzen." Small 4to. Published for the Palestine A*, 
sociation of London. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



353 



leads to another small village, with, a large cemetery ; 
the tombs and houses alike built of burnt brick. An 
hour further conducts the traveller to the walls of 
Damascus. About a quarter of a mile on this side of 
the western gate, is shewn the place where Saul fell 
to the earth, smitten with blindness by a light from 
heaven. It is on the side of the old road, near the 
ruined arch of a bridge, and close by are the tombs of 
some devout Christians ; but there is no chapel or 
convent built over it. The Empress Helena has not 
been here ; and there is nothing to check the indul- 
gence of the supposition that, possibly, this may be 
about the spot of that memorable transaction. 

PANIAS. 

Bukckhardt, in coming from Damascus, pursued 
the more direct route taken by the caravans, which 
crosses the Jordan at Jacob's Bridge. Captains Irby 
and Mangles left this road at Khan Sasa, and passed 
to the westward for Panias, thus striking into a mid- 
dle route between the high road to Acre, and that 
by Raschia and Hasbeya. The first part of the road 
from Sasa, led through a fine plain, watered by a 
pretty, winding rivulet, with numerous tributary 
streams, and many old ruined mills. It then ascended 
over a very rugged and rocky soil, quite destitute 
of vegetation, having in some places traces of an 
ancient paved way, " probably the Roman road from 
Damascus to Cesarea Philippi." The higher part of 
Djebel Sheikh was seen on the right. The road 
became less stony, and the shrubs increased in number, 
size, and beauty, as they descended into a very rich 
little plain, at the immediate foot of that mountain. 
" There is a conspicuous tomb in this valley: and 
a rivulet, which appears to take its source at the foot 
x 2 



354 



PALESTINE; OR, 



of the mountains, passes along the western side of the 
plain in a southerly direction, when its course turns 
more to the westward, and rushing, in a very pic- 
turesque manner, through a deep chasm, covered by 
shrubs of various descriptions, it joins the Jordan at 
Panias.' 7 * This is marked in Arrowsmith's chart, 
as the real source of the Jordan; the fountains at 
Panias, though by far the most copious, not being the 
most distant source. " From this plain," continues 
Captain M., u we ascended, and, after passing a very 
small village, saw on our left, close to us, a very 
picturesque lake, apparently perfectly circular, of little 
more than a mile in circumference, surrounded on all 
sides by sloping hills, richly wooded. The singularity 
of this lake is, that it has no apparent supply or 
discharge ; and its waters appeared perfectly still, 
though clear and limpid. A great many wild-fowl 
were swimming in it. Josephus mentions it under 
the name of Phiala (cup), in allusion to the shape 
of the lake. It was supposed by the ancients to be the 
real source of the Jordan. A passage in the Jewish 
historian notices, that they threw straw into the lake, 
which came out at the apparent source at Panias.-)* 

* This description seems to answer to the water of Hasbeia^ 
whether it joins the Jordan at Panias, is a question. 

t '* Now Panium is thought to be the fountain of Jordan ; but, 
in reality, it is carried thither after an occult manner from the 
dace called Phiala. This place lies as you go up to Trachonitis, 
and is 120 furlongs from Cesarea, and is not far out of the road 
on the right-hand. And indeed it hath its name of Phiala (vial 
or bowl) very justly, from the roundness of its circumference, 
as being round like a wheel ; its water continues always up to 
its edges, without either sinking or running over ; and this 
origin of Jordan was formerly not known. It. was discovered 
so to be when Philip was Tetrarch of Trachonitis; for he had 
chaff thrown into Phiala, and it was found at Panium, where 
the ancients thought the fountain-head of the river was, whither 



THE HOLY LAND. 



355 



But this is impossible ; for, to arrive at Panias, its 
discharge must pass under the rivulet which Arrow- 
smith points out as the true source. On quitting 
Phiala, at but a short distance from it, we crossed 
a stream, which discharges into the larger one which 
we first saw : the latter we followed for a considerable 
distance ; and then, mounting a hill to the S.W., had 
in view the great Saracenic castle near Panias, the 
town of that name, and the plain of the Jordan, as 
far as the Lake Houle, with the mountains on the 
other side of the plain, forming altogether a fine 
coup d'ceil. As we descended towards Panias, we 
found the country extremely beautiful. Great quan- 

it had been, therefore, carried by the waters- .Now Jordan's 
visible stream arises from this cavern, and divides the marshes and 
fens of the Lake Semechonitis ; and when it hath run another 
120 furlongs, it first passes by the city Julias, and then passes 
through the middle of the Lake Gennesareth."— Josephus, Wars, 
book iii. chap. 10, § 7» M. Seetzen makes the Lake of Phiala two 
leagues distant to the east of Panias ; and says, it now bears the 
name of Birket-el-Ram, under which name it is given in Arrow- 
smith's map. But Burckhardt states, that what the Bedouins call 
Birket-el-Ram, and the peasants Birket Abou Armeii, is a reser- 
voir of water a few hundred paces to the S. of the regular road, 
near the foot of Tel Abou Nedy : it is, he says, about 120 paces in 
circumference, and is supplied by two springs which are never dry, 
one of which is in the bottom of a deep well in the midst of the 
Birket. Just by this reservoir are the ruins of an ancient town, 
about a quarter of an hour in circuit, of which nothing remains 
but large heaps of stones. Five minutes further is another Birket, 
which is filled by rain-water only. The neighbourhood of these 
reservoirs is covered with a forest of short oaks. The road now 
begins to descend gently ; and an hour and a half further, just by 
the road on the left, is ?« a large pond" about 200 paces in circum- 
ference, called Birket Nefah or Tefah : it was said to contain a 
spring, but some denied it. " From which I inferred," says 
Burckhardt, (< that the water never dries up completely. I take 
this to be the Lake Phiala, as there is no other lake or pond in the 
neighbourhood."— -Travels in Syria, p. 314. 



356 



PALESTINE ; OR, 



tities of wild flowers, and a variety of shrubs just 
budding, together with the richness of the verdure, 
grass, corn, and beans, shewed us all at once the 
beauties of spring (Feb. 24), and conducted us into a 
climate quite different to that of Damascus. In the 
evening, we entered Panias, crossing a causeway con- 
structed over the rivulet, which flows from the foot of 
Djebel Sheikh. The river here rushes over great 
rocks in a very picturesque manner, its banks being 
covered with shrubs and the ruins of the ancient 
walls." 

Panias, afterwards called Cesarea Philippi, has re- 
sumed its ancient name. The present town of Banias 
is small. Seetzen describes it as a little hamlet of 
about twenty miserable huts, inhabited by Mahom- 
medans ; but Burckhardt says, it contains about 150 
houses, inhabited mostly by Turks : there are also 
Greeks, Druses, and Enzairies. It belongs toHasbeia, 
whose emir nominates the sheikh. It is situated at 
the foot of the mountain called Djebel Heish. To 
the N.E. of the village, is the source of the river of 
Banias, which flows under a well-built bridge on the 
north side of the village, near which are some remains 
of the ancient town. The ground it now occupies is 
of a triangular form, enclosed by the river on one side, 
a rivulet on the other, and the mountain at the back. 
The u Castle of Banias " is situated on the summit of 
a lofty mountain : it was built, Seetzen says, without 
giving his authority, in the time of the caliphs. 
Burckhardt says, it seems to have been erected during 
the period of the Crusades ; he saw no inscriptions, 
but was afterwards told that there are several, both in 
Arabic and in Frank (Greek or Latin). The moun- 
tain on which it stands, forming part of the Djebel 



THE HOLY LAND. 



357 



Heish, is an hour and a quarter from Banias, bearing 
from it E. by S. u It is now completely in ruins, but 
was once a strong fortress. Its whole circumference 
is twenty-five minutes. It is surrounded with a wall 
ten feet thick, flanked with numerous round towers, 
built with equal blocks of stone, each about two feet 
square. The keep, or citadel, seems to have been 
on the highest summit on the eastern side, where the 
walls are stronger than on the other side. On the 
western side, within the precincts of the castle, are 
ruins of many private habitations. At both the 
western corners, runs a succession of dark, strongly- 
built, low apartments, like cells, vaulted, and with small, 
narrow, loop-holes, as if for musquetry. On this side 
also is a well, more than twenty feet square, walled in, 
with a vaulted roof at least twenty-five feet high. 
The well was, even in this dry season, full of water : 
there are three others in the castle. It has but one 
gate, on the south side. In winter time, the shep- 
herds of the Felahs of the Heish, who encamp upon 
the mountain, pass the night in the castle with their 
cattle." The view from hence is described as mag- 
nificent. The wady at its S.E. foot is called Wady 
Kyb ; that on its western side, Wady-el-Kashabe ; 
and that " on the other side of the latter," (the equi- 
vocal expression is Burckhardt's,) Wady-el-Asal. 

Where was the temple erected by Herod the Great 
in honour of Augustus, out of gratitude to the Em- 
peror for having put him in possession of Trachonitis ? 
Seetzen remarks, that the circuit of the ancient walls 
of the city is easily distinguishable, but that no traces 
remain of this magnificent edifice. Burckhardt no- 
ticed some remains of the ancient town near the 
bridge, but says, that the principal part seems to 
have been on the opposite side of the river, where 



358 



PALESTINE; OR, 



the ruins extend for a quarter of an hour beyond the 
bridge. No walls remain ; but great quantities of 
stones and architectural fragments are scattered about. 
He saw here one entire column of small dimensions, 
and in the village, on the left side of the river, a 
granite column one foot and a half in diameter. On 
the south side of the village are the ruins of a strong 
castle, which, from its appearance and" mode of con- 
struction, may, he conjectures, be of the same age 
as the castle on the mountain. It is surrounded with 
a broad ditch, within which was a wall : several towers 
are still standing. A very solid bridge, which crosses 
the winter torrent Wady-el-Kyd, leads to the entrance 
of the castle, over which is an Arabic inscription, 
with a date coinciding with the era of the Crusades. 
There are five or six granite columns built into the 
walls of the gateway. There can be no doubt that 
these formed part of some ancient edifice, and possibly 
of the temple in question. The whole mountain, 
however, had the name of Panium ; and Dr. Richard- 
son is disposed to imagine, that the Khallat-el-Banias 
on the mountain may be built on the site of the 
temple. The commanding situation, overlooking the 
whole plain, may be thought to have recommended it 
to Herod, as comporting with the magnificence of his 
conceptions ; and it is remarkable, that, distant as it is 
from the town, it should preserve the name of the 
Castle of Banias. The determination of this point 
must be left to future travellers. 

The city of Panias owed its Roman name, and 
much of its consequence and architectural decoration, 
to Herod Philip the Tetrarch, who called it Cesarea 
in honour of Tiberius Caesar : it received the adjunct 
of his own name to ditinguish it from Cesarea of 
Palestine. It was indebted for further improvements 



THE HOLY LAND. 



359 



to the royal liberality of Agrippa.* The neighbour- 
hood is very beautiful, richly wooded, and abounding 
with game. The " apparent source of the Jordan," 
flows from under a cave at the foot of a precipice, in 
the perpendicular sides of which are several niches, 
adorned with pilasters, having under them Greek 
inscriptions. Upon the top of the rock, to the left 
of these, is a mosque dedicated to Nebbi Khouder, 
called by the Christians Mar Georgius, which is a 
place of devotion for Mahommedan strangers passing 
this way. Seetzen says : " The copious source of the 
Hiver of Banias rises near a remarkable grotto in the 
rock, on the declivity of which I copied some ancient 
Greek inscriptions, dedicated to Pan and the Nymphs 
of the Fountain. The ancients gave the name of 
' Source of the Jordan' to the spring from which the 
Banias rises ; and its beauty might entitle it to that 
name. But, in fact, it appears, that the preference is 
due to the spring of the river Hasberia, which rises 
half a league to the west of Hasbeia, and which forms 
the largest branch of the Jordan. The spring of Tel- 
el-Kadi, which the natives take for the source of the 
Jordan, is that which least merits the name." 

Pococke observes, that St. Jerome mentions a vil- 
lage called Dan, four miles from this site. Burckhardt 
states, that an hour and a quarter to the N.E. of 
Banias, is situated 64 the source of the Jordan, or, 
as it is here called, Dhan" in the plain, near the hill 
called Tel-el-Kadi — the spring to which Seetzen re- 
fers ; and the distance agrees with the place mentioned 
by Jerome. There are, we are told, two springs near 
each other, one smaller than the other, whose waters 

* " As for Panium itself, its natural beauty had been improved 
by the royal liberality of Agrippa, and adorned at his expense."— 
Joseph. Wars, book iii. chap. 10. 



360 



PALESTINE; OK, 



unite immediately below : the larger source imme- 
diately forms a river twelve or fifteen yards across, 
which, rushes rapidly over a stony bed into the lower 
plain. Both sources are on level ground, among rocks 
of tufwacke. There are no ruins of any kind near 
the springs ; but the hill over them seems to have 
been built upon, though nothing now is visible. At a 
quarter of an hour to the N. of the spring, are ruins 
of ancient habitations, built of the black tufwacke, the 
principal rock found m the plain. The few houses at 
present inhabited on that spot, are called EnkeiL 
" I was told," adds Burckhardt, " that the ancient 
name of the River of Banias was Djour, which, 
added to the name of Dhan, made Jourdan. The 
more correct etymology is, probably. Or Dhan, — in 
Hebrew, the River of Dhan. Lower down, between 
the Houle and the Lake Tabaria, it is called Or den 
by the inhabitants. To the southward of the Lake of 
Tabaria, it bears the name of Sherya, till it falls into 
the Dead Sea." 

The whole of this statement, there is reason to 
suspect, rests upon hearsay ; and when it is recollected 
that Burckhardt's authorities in this quarter were, 
for the most part, Greek priests, there is the more 
necessity for caution in receiving that part of it which 
relates to the ancient names. That the Banias was 
anciently called the Djour, is a mere legend ; and as 
little is it to be believed, that the river, below Lake 
Houle, is called the Orden, unless by the Christians. 
It is, however, to this legendary opinion respecting 
the source of the Jordan, that Milton may be thought 
to refer, when he says, 

M Here the double-founted stream, 
Jordan, true limit eastward." * 

* Par Lost, book xii. line 144, 



THE HOLY LAND. 



361 



The same description would, nevertheless, apply to it, 
as formed by the junction of the waters of Hasbeia 
and Banias ; and Seetzen's remark is deserving of 
attention, that this third source of Tel. el -Kadi least 
merits the name of the source of the Jordan. 

The name Panias is of classic origin, and is sup- 
posed to be derived from the worship of Pan. The 
cavern and ILm/av, or sanctuary of Pan, are described 
by Josephus. The niche in the cavern probably con- 
tained a statue of the god. In the middle niche 
in the rock, the base of a statue is still visible. 
Round the source of the river are a number of hewn 
stones, which appear to have belonged to some ancient 
edifice. Some have supposed this place to be the Dan 
of the Scriptures, on the slender ground of the faint 
resemblance of the names. The hill is considered 
as the Mount Hermon of the Old Testament, that 
being mentioned as the northern boundary of the 
Land of Israel on the other side of Jordan, as over- 
looking the Valley of Lebanon, and as a boundary 
of the country of the Hivites in Mount Lebanon, 
which extended from Baal-Hermon to Hamath.* If 
so, this would seem to be " the Valley of Lebanon," 
and Panias might claim to be considered as the Baal- 
Gad which was under Mount Hermon. f The name 
of Baal, thus connected both with the mountain and 
the city, would seem to refer to the heathen worship 
that was carried on here. It was the same deity, 
apparently, that gave his name to Baalbec. Without 
attempting to trace any connexion between the attri- 
butes of the Syrian Baal and the classic Pan, it 
would not be a violent conjecture, that the worship of 
the one might succeed the adoration of the other 



* Josh. xi. 17; xiii. 11 ; Judges iii. 3. 
PART II. Y 



t Josh. xiii. !>. 



252 



PALESTINE ; OR, 



deity. The mountain, as well as the city, would 
undergo a correspondent change of name ; and thus, 
Baal-Hermon would become Panium, and Baal-Gad, 
Panias. In like manner, Baal-Bek was changed — 
we might say, translated into Heliopolis. A sacred 
fountain in Greece almost invariably points out the 
site of an ancient temple ; and the usual characteris- 
tics of these agiasmata, or holy fountains, are, a 
romantic landscape, and the neighbourhood of a cavern 
or grove. Here we have every circumstance united, 
that superstition required to give sacredness to the 
place. 

But, in reference to the ancient names, there is a 
remarkable passage in Josephus, which deserves con- 
sideration. The marshes of Lake Semechonitis reach, 
he says, " as far as the place Daphne, which, in other 
respects, is a delicious place, and hath sueh fountains 
as supply water to what is called Little Jordan, under 
the temple of the golden calf, where it is sent into 
Great Jordan." * Reland supposes that the text is cor- 
rupted, and that, instead of Daphne in this place, we 
should read Dan. If not, we may conclude that the 
ancient Dan was afterwards called Daphne. The Little 
Jordan is, most probably, the Banias of Burckhardt, 
which, at the distance of an hour and a half in the 
plain below, falls into what Seetzen denominates the 
Hasbeia, — the Moiet Hasbeia, which is the larger 
branch. Near the confluence of these streams, we must 
look for the Dan of the Scripture, and the exact situa- 
tion of one of Jeroboam's golden calves, -f- Panias, 
supposed by the ancients to be the source of the Jordan, 
can hardly be the place referred to by Josephus. It 

* Wars, book iv. chap. 1. 

t See Judges xviii. 29. 1 Kings xii. 29. 



THE HOLY LAND. 



363 



must, therefore, be below it ; and we are strongly 
inclined to believe, that the sequestered mound and 
the grove of venerable oaks, described by Dr. Richard- 
son in such glowing language, will be found to answer 
most completely to the Daphne of Josephus,* and 
the Dan of Scripture, where once stood the temple of 
the golden calf. It must be near this delicious spot, 
that the river of Hasbeia meets with the Banias or 
Little Jordan ; and the marshes of Semachonitis 
extend almost to the base of the mount. It is ob- 
servable also, that the plain changes its name nearly 
about the same place, from Ard Houle to Ard Banias : 
and it is by the confluence of the streams here, that 
the river is formed, which Josephus distinguishes as 
the Great Jordan. 

CONCLUDING REMARKS. 

Having now traversed the whole Land of Israel 
west of this boundary, from Beersheba to Dan, we 
close here our account of Palestine ; preferring, for 
the convenience of the arrangement, to include the 
districts east of the Jordan, under the general deno- 
mination of Syria, which in strictness applies to the 
whole eountry. The parts we have described, however, 
are all that are usually comprehended under the term 
Holy Land ; although, as the scene of Scripture his- 
tory, the theatre of miracle and of prophecy, — the 
Peninsula of Mount Sinai, the shores of the Idumean 
Sea, and the coasts of Asia Minor, might lay claim to 
the appellation. But we have now visited the whole 
of Palestine, Judea, Samaria, and Galilee — those 

* Lightfoot says, that Riblah, a place on the border of Israel, 
is by the Taigumists rendered Daphne. They render Numbers 
xxxiv. 11, " and the border shall go down to Daphne." 



364 



PALESTINE; OR, 



countries which, ahove all others under the sun, are 
interesting to the Christian. And abhorrent alike 
from reason and from true piety, as is the superstition 
that has grafted itself upon this interest, yet, the 
curiosity which inspires the traveller, in reference 
more peculiarly to these scenes, is rational and laud- 
able. If Troy and Thebes, if Athens and Rome, are 
visited with classic enthusiasm, much more worthy of 
awakening the strongest emotions in the mind of a 
Christian, must be the country whose history as far 
transcends in interest that of every other, as its lite- 
rature (if we may apply that term to the divine volume) 
excels in sublimity, all the ethics, and philosophy, and 
poetry, and eloquence of the heathen world. This 
sentiment of interest or of reverence has, indeed, 
no necessary connexion with religious principle or 
enlightened worship ; for it may actuate alike the 
pious and the profligate : and, in the character of the 
Greek or Romish pilgrim, it is too generally found in 
connexion with an utter destitution of moral principle. 
The savage fanaticism of the Crusades was an illus- 
tration of this fact on a grand scale ; and the same 
spirit that breathed in Peter the Hermit, yet survives ; 
the same fanaticism in a milder form actuates the 
pilgrims who continue to visit the Holy Sepulchre, 
with the view of expiating their sins by the per- 
formance of so meritorious a penance. The Mussul- 
man hadgi, or the Hindoo devotee, differs little in 
the true character of his religion, from these misguided 
Christians, and as little perhaps in his morals as in 
his creed. Only the stocks and stones in which their 
respective worship alike terminates, are called by less 
holy names. It becomes the Protestant to avoid the 
appearance of symbolising with this degrading and 
brutalising idolatry. But were all this mummery 



THE HOLY LAND. 



365 



swept away, and the Holy Land cleared of all the 
rubbish brought into it by the Empress Helena, the 
holy sepulchre included, more than enough would 
remain to repay the Christian traveller, in the durable 
monuments of Nature. We know not the spot where 
Christ was crucified ; nor can determine the cave in 
which, for part of three days, his body was ensepul- 
chred ; nor is the exact point ascertainable from which 
he ascended to heaven. The Scriptures are silent, and 
no other authority can supply the information. But 
there are the scenes which he looked upon, the 
holy mount which once bore the temple, that Mount 
Olivet which once overlooked Jerusalem; — there is 
Mount Gerizim overhanging the Valley of Shechem, 
and the hill where once stood Samaria ; — there is 
Nazareth, within whose secluded vale our Lord so 
long awaited the time appointed for his public 
ministry,— the plain of Gennesareth and the Sea of 
Galilee,. — the mountains to which he retired, the 
plains in which he wrought his miracles, the waters 
which he trod, — and here the Jordan still rolls its 
consecrated waters to the bituminous lake where 
Sodom stood. 



I 



367 



APPENDIX. (A.) 

NATURAL HISTORY. 

It was the Editor's intention to subjoin a fuller 
account of the natural productions of Palestine ; but 
he finds that this would occupy more space than can 
be devoted to a subject remotely connected with the 
design of the present work. He must content him- 
self, therefore, with referring to the sources of infor- 
mation. 

Dr. Shaw acknowledges that he was in too great 
haste, in travelling through the Holy Land, to make 
many observations, much less to collect specimens. 
He notices, generally, the variety of anemonies, ranun- 
culusses, colchicas, fritillaries, and tulips, with which 
the plains abound, and the quantity of game of all 
kinds ; but the only curious animals, he says, that he 
had the good fortune to see, were the skinkore, a 
species of lizard, and the daman Israel, supposed to 
be the saphan * of the Scriptures ; an animal of the 
size of a rabbit,but in the shortness of its fore-feet, re- 
sembling the jerboa. 

The notices contained in Hasselquist's Travels, are 
scarcely less meagre. The animals he saw, were only 
five sorts of quadrupeds, — the porcupine, the jackall, -f- 
the fox, the rock -goat, and the fallow-deer ; and fifteen 
of birds. His collection of plants is somewhat more 
ample, and will be found deserving of attention. It 
is remarkable, however, that the pupil of Linnaeus 
should have given the bare catalogue, without any re- 
gard to botanical arrangement. 

* Rendered " coney " f " The fox of Samson." 



368 



APPENDIX. 



Dr. Clarke's Travels contain some important con« 
tributions to the Botany of Palestine ; but he also 
was in haste, and saw but a very small part of the 
Holy Land. 

In the Travels of Burckhardt, and of Captains Irby 
and Mangles, will be found many scattered notices 
peculiarly interesting to the naturalist. But the in- 
formation is not precise enough to enable us to refer 
the productions alluded to, to their proper place in 
a scientific arrangement. The more remarkable of 
these will be found mentioned in the body of our 
work; and they will supply matter for the more 
minute observation of future travellers. At present, 
our knowledge both of what may be called the Scrip, 
tural, and of the actual or modern Natural History 
of Palestine, must be considered as very imperfect. 
For remarks on the mandrake, the nature of which 
has been a subject of learned dissertation, see Shaw's 
Travels, folio, p. 369, and MaundrelTs Journey, under 
Naplosa. But the amplest account of the animals and 
vegetable productions mentioned in the Scriptures, is 
that given by the very ingenious author of the Frag- 
ments supplementary to Calmet's Dictionary. See the 
edition of 1823, vol. iv. part 2, pp. 9—128. 



369 



APPENDIX. (B.) 



GLOSSARY OF ARABIC WORDS OCCURRING IN THE 
GEOGRAPHY OF PALESTINE. 



Abd Servant, e. g. Abd 
Allah, servant of God. 
Abou. Father. 
Ain. Spring. (Eye.) 
Ard. Land. District. 

Bahr. Lake. River. 
Sea. 

Belled. Town. Village. 

Ben. Son. 

Beni. Sons. 

Bet. (Bait.) House. 

Bir. (Beer.) Well 

Birket. Pond. Cistern. 

Caphar. (Ghaffer.) Toll. 

Tribute. 
Caphar. (Heb.) Field. 

Camp. Station. 

Djebel. Mountain. 
Djeser. Bridge. 

Gala. (Khallat.) Castle. 



Ghaffer. (Caphar.) Toll. 
Tribute. 

Ibn. Son. 

Kafer. (Kafir.) Infidel. 
Kepha. Rock. 
Khallat. Castle. 
Khan, Inn. 

Min. Port. 

Moye, Moiet, Water. 

Nahr, (Same as Bahr.) 
Lake. River. Sea. 

Om. (Oom.) Mother 

Serai. Palace. 
Sheikh. Chief. 

Tel. Heap. 
Tor. High. 

Wady. Valley. Ravine- 



370 



APPENDIX. (C.) 

DESCRIPTION OF THE GROUND-PLAN OF 
JERUSALEM. 



1. Bethlehem Gate. 

2. Damascus Gate. 

3. Herod's or Epliraim 

Gate. 

4. St. Stephen's Gate, 
n The Golden Gate, 

(walled up). 

6. Gate into El Aksa. 

7. Dung Gate. 

8. Zion Gate. 

9. Armenian Convent 

and Garden. 

10. Castle of the Pi sans. 

11. Pool of Bathsheba. 

12. House for Female 

Pilgrims. 

13. Latin Convent. 

14. Ruins. 

15. Church of the Sepul- 

chre, a. The Sepul- 
chre, b- Calvary. 
IS. Herod's Palace. 



17- Mosque of St. Anne. 

18. Pilate's House. 

19. Pool of Bethesda. 

20. Haram Schereeff. a. 

Throne of Solomon. 

b. Where Mahomet 
is to sit on the 
Day of Judgment. 

c. Entrance to the 
Grotto of Sidn Aisa 

21. Mosque of Omar. 
12. Mosque of El Aksa. 

23. Bazars. 

24. House of Annas. 

25. Jews' Synagogue. 

26. House of Omar Ef- 

fendi. 

27. Palace of Caiaphas. 

28. Sepulchre of David. 

29. Tombs. 

30. King's Pool. 

31. Pool of Siloam. 



I 

I 



371 



APPENDIX. (D.) 

DESIDERATA. 

It has been thought that it might aid future 
travellers to throw further light on the topogra- 
phy of Palestine, to direct their attention to a few 
desiderata. 

The sites of the following ancient towns require 
to be ascertained : On the coast, Antipatris and Apol- 
lonia, between Cesarea and Jaffa ; and Anthedon 
(Agrippias), between Gaza and Raphia, — probably at 
or near Dair. On the road from Gaza to the ancient 
Eleutheropolis, the whole of which is untravelled by 
Europeans, Gath, Marissa, Adora, Lachish. Eleu- 
theropolis itself, the capital of the Idumeans. See 
p. 195. In the same direction probably, about twenty 
miles S.W. of Hebron, Beersheba in Simeon. Also, 
the ruins at Abdi in the desert, three days' distance 
below Hebron. See p. 201. At Hebron the Cave of 
Machpelah. Examine also the House of Abraham, 
between Sipheer and Hebron. See p. 200. The 
whole road from Hebron to the Gulf of Akaba remains 
to be explored. Also the route from Hebron to 
Rihhah. The bearing and length of the Dead Sea 
require to be verified. 

At Jerusalem — 1. The precise bearings are required 
of the Mount of Olives, Bethlehem, &c. 2. The 
elevations round the city require to be explored, and 
the names ascertained from Jewish or Arab natives : 
in particular, the hill on the N.W. called Mount 
Gihon, and that on the N. supposed to be Scopo, 
where Titus encamped ; by some fixed on as the 
site of Calvary. (Nos. 90 and 88 in Dr. Richard- 
son's Ichnographical Plan.) Also the Hill of Evil 



372 



APPENDIX. 



Council (Dr. Clarke's Mount Zion), S. of the city; 
and the mountain which rises from the bed of the 
Kedron on the S.E. 3. The course and distribution 
of the aqueduct from Solomon's Pools to Jerusalem, 
and the cisterns which supply the present city, are 
deserving of investigation. 4. The course of the 
Tyropceon, supposed to be a line drawn transversely 
from near the Castle of the Pisans to the Pool of 
Siloam (No. 31). 5. The sepulchre of David on Mount 
Zion, and the ruins between Mount Zion and the 
mosque of Omar. 6. The ravine crossed by the road 
to St. John's in the Desert. 7- Ruifns of a tower 
opposite to Bethlehem gate. 8. Turkish oratory be- 
yond the cemeteries N. of the city, and near the 
Dragon's Pool — query, its history? 9. The source 
and course of the Kedron. 10. The cryptce on the 
summit of olivet, described by Dr. E, D. Clarke. — An 
intelligent Jew would probably be found the best 
cicerone. 

At Nablous, the Beer-el-Samaria, the Beer-el- 
Yakoub, and the Beer-el- Yusef ; the ruins on Mount 
Gerizim and Mount Ebal; and, between this route 
and the Jordan, the site of Bethel. The road from 
Nablous to Cesarea might be worth exploring. 

In Galilee, the site of Zabulon, of Jotapata, of 
Capernaum, and of Dan (query, Daphne?). Also, 
the bearing and extent of the Lake of Tiberias, and 
the plains and wadys on its western coast. The 
sources of the water of Hasbeia and Tel-el-Kadi, and 
their junction with the stream of Panias. 

END OF PALESTINE. 

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